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Golden Fetters
The Gold Standard and the Great Depression, 1919-1939
1985
First Published
4.18
Average Rating
478
Number of Pages
This book offers a reassessment of the international monetary problems that led to the global economic crisis of the 1930s. It explores the connections between the gold standard—the framework regulating international monetary affairs until 1931—and the Great Depression that broke out in 1929. Eichengreen shows how economic policies, in conjunction with the imbalances created by World War I, gave rise to the global crisis of the 1930s. He demonstrates that the gold standard fundamentally constrained the economic policies that were pursued and that it was largely responsible for creating the unstable economic environment on which those policies acted. The book also provides a valuable perspective on the economic policies of the post-World War II period and their consequences.
Avg Rating
4.18
Number of Ratings
106
5 STARS
42%
4 STARS
39%
3 STARS
17%
2 STARS
2%
1 STARS
1%
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Author

Barry Eichengreen
Barry Eichengreen
Author · 11 books

Barry Eichengreen* is the George C. Pardee and Helen N. Pardee Professor of Economics and Professor of Political Science at the University of California, Berkeley, where he has taught since 1987. He is a Research Associate of the National Bureau of Economic Research (Cambridge, Massachusetts) and Research Fellow of the Centre for Economic Policy Research (London, England). In 1997-98 he was Senior Policy Advisor at the International Monetary Fund. He is a fellow of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences (class of 1997). Professor Eichengreen is the convener of the Bellagio Group of academics and economic officials and chair of the Academic Advisory Committee of the Peterson Institute of International Economics. He has held Guggenheim and Fulbright Fellowships and has been a fellow of the Center for Advanced Study in the Behavioral Sciences (Palo Alto) and the Institute for Advanced Study (Berlin). He is a regular monthly columnist for Project Syndicate. His most recent books are Exorbitant Privilege: The Rise and Fall of the Dollar and the Future of the International Monetary System (January 2011)(shortlisted for the Financial Times and Goldman Sachs Business Book of the Year Award in 2011), Emerging Giants: China and India in the World Economy, co-edited with Poonam Gupta and Ranjiv Kumar (2010), Labor in the Era of Globalization, co-edited with Clair Brown and Michael Reich (2009), Institutions for Regionalism: Enhancing Asia's Economic Cooperation and Integration, coedited with Jong-Wha Lee (2009), and Fostering Monetary & Financial Cooperation in East Asia, co-edited with Duck-Koo Chung (2009). Other books include Globalizing Capital: A History of the International Monetary System, Second Edition (2008), The European Economy since 1945: Coordinated Capitalism and Beyond (updated paperback edition, 2008), Bond Markets in Latin America: On the Verge of a Big Bang?, co-edited with Eduardo Borensztein, Kevin Cowan, and Ugo Panizza (2008), and China, Asia, and the New World Economy, co-edited with Charles Wyplosz and Yung Chul Park (2008). Professor Eichengreen was awarded the Economic History Association's Jonathan R.T. Hughes Prize for Excellence in Teaching in 2002 and the University of California at Berkeley Social Science Division's Distinguished Teaching Award in 2004. He is the recipient of a doctor honoris causa from the American University in Paris, and the 2010 recipient of the Schumpeter Prize from the International Schumpeter Society. He was named one of Foreign Policy Magazine 's 100 Leading Global Thinkers in 2011. He is Immediate Past President of the Economic History Association (2010-11 academic year). * This is the biosketch available at his faculty page.

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