Euro on trial. To reform or split up?

Abstract:

Five years since its launch may be an appropriate interval to test out the worthiness or otherwise of the Euro. This book considers this question and discusses whether or not it is capable of reform or deserving of the scrap heap.

The work is organised over five chapters. The first chapter provides some background to the creation of the Euro and considers one or two alternatives which might have been on offer. Chapter two explores the role and importance of the founders and functionaries and the Franco-German influence. Consideration is given in chapter three to the near blasphemous proposals for separation and dissolution. The founding fathers had an implicit strategy to prevent disintegration and their struggles on the journey to permanent union are the focus of chapter four. Under the provoking title 'Way Back, Way Forward' chapter five explores several avenues which might be considered and assesses the damage of lost opportunities for change along the journey to date. The author closes with the thought that as ever the future of the Euro remains dependant upon the state of the German economy, and that Berlin will not suffer silently a continuing depression of economic activity constrained in remedies by the ECB and EMU rules.

The work will interest scholars, students, researchers, policy makers and economists engaged in European studies, European integration and international finance.

Brendan Brown is a practising economist in the City of London.