*** VINCENT DUJARDIN, YVES DE CORDT, RAFAEL COSTA, VIRGINIE DE MORIAME (Eds.): La crise économique et financière de 2008-2009. L'entrée dans le 21e siècle? Presses Interuniversitaires Européennes / Peter Lang (1 av. Maurice, B-1050 Brussels. Tel: (41-32) 3761717 - Fax: 3761727 - email: pie@peterlang.com - Internet: http://www.peterlang.com ). 'Relations financières internationales' series, No. 3. 2010, 383 pp, €40.50. ISBN 978-90-5201-539-2.
The economic and financial crisis that hit the world in 2008 has shaken the strongest held beliefs to the core, leaving a series of unanswered questions in the place of the old certainties. Was it right to compare this crisis with the Great Depression of 1929? In what way have the politicians in charge done better than their predecessors? More generally, how did the world deal with previous crises? Have the media in recent months restricted themselves to providing news or have they been involved as active players? What is one to make of the various bailouts, laws and regulation of the markets and financial institutions in Europe and at global level? Should there be a radical over-haul of self-regulation in the field of company law or is it still possible to try and strike a balance between hard law and soft law to strengthen corporate governance? What about the ever more pressing problem of sovereign debt and how it may impact on state engagement in economic life? In this connection, has the crisis actually led to more Europe?
Regular readers of Agence Europe and its 'Behind the News' column will be aware that in terms of economic governance, Europe has achieved more over the past twenty-four months than since the adoption of the first Treaties of Rome - which in fact marked a step backwards in terms of management of the economy from the Paris Treaties that set up the European Coal and Steel Community. Readers will be just as interested in the answers to the above questions provided in this book following a conference in May 2009 at Louvain-la-Neuve in Belgium, organised by the 'Institut d'Etudes Européennes' of the 'Université Catholique de Louvain'. The answers are the fruit of an interdisciplinary approach involving, among others, The International Triffin Foundations, the political science department of the Louvain School of Management, the faculty of arts and philosophy and the 'Observatoire du Récit Médiatique'. These research units were all needed to try and discern the various facets of an unusual crisis both in terms of its complexity and in terms of its consequences, ensuring that the national (Belgian), European and international perspectives are all taken into account. Mission accomplished because this fine book provides analyses intermeshing the views of top financial and monetary experts like Alexandre Lamfalussy with those of historians, economists, lawyers, political scientists and practitioners, one of the best known of whom being Jean De Ruyt, currently Belgium's Representative to the European Union.
The book is divided into five parts. The first sets the current economic and financial crisis in perspective, with Alexandre Lamfalussy explaining what is unique about the current crisis and Prof. Youssef Cassis of Geneva University describing it as 'the first big truly global financial crisis in history.' Three other essays look at the responsibility of banks and authorities in the crisis and various reasons why the media did not see the crisis coming ('proximity to the industry, absence of a critical eye, examining a narrow range of sources, structural problems with carrying out long-term investigations are all factors that contributed to the fact that the press did not anticipate the financial crisis,' explains Prof. Marc Lits), while Bernard Remiche, head of the economic and social law department at UCL, calls for a re-adjustment of legality and economic opportunity, the indispensable reform of the system after years of 'too much free-marketism' requiring, in his view, firstly the restoring and introducing of values and a hierarchy of values with humanity at the centre, which implies questioning the ethical future of our society. After the more historical second section that includes a decrypting of the US model, the third, more technical but no less interesting section, examines the regulation of quoted companies and the financial industry at national and European level, with Prof. Christian de Visscher commenting on the institutional model of reinforced coordination in multilevel regulation of the financial markets that was set up in the wake of the Lamfalussy Report.
Following the fourth section looking at various aspects of the crisis' international dimensions (stock market bubbles, the role of currency and sovereign debt in the emergence of new global balances and the role of the Bank of International Settlements), the final part contains more philosophical essays. Christian Arnsperger takes as his starting point the 'rôle of anxiety in financialisation' and discerns 'a crisis of existential causes,' explaining: 'It is capitalism itself which, by feeding everyone's anxieties (rich and poor alike) instead of reducing them, precipitated extreme financialising, excess debt, competition among banks and, ultimately, the crisis itself.' This brings us to a question formulated in the next essay by lawyer Robert Wtterwulghe: 'Surely greed and arrogance (…) are the true causes of the crisis?' Asking the question clearly provides the answer - which makes one think that Prof. Isabelle Cassiers is so right when she calls for 'an intermeshing of research into how to get out of the crisis with respect for the environment, fairer sharing, democratic legitimisation of state intervention and an examination of the meaning of our activities.'
Michel Theys
*** HERBERT DIETER: Die internationalen Finanzmärkte stellen die Eurozone auf die Probe. Stiftung Wissenschaft und Politk/Deutsches Institut für Internationale Politik und Sicherheit (3-4 Ludwigkirchplatz, D-10719 Berlin. Tel: (49-30) 880070 - Fax: 88007100 - email: swp@swp-berlin.org - Internet: http://www.swp-berlin.org ). "SWP - Aktuell" series, No. 19. 2010, 4 pp.
The financial crisis that hit Europe in 2008 and 2009 led to what has since been called 'the Greek crisis'. Long known for lack of budget discipline, Greece experienced a dramatic situation at the start of the year with colossal public debt and loss of credibility in Greek statistics and the country's budget. This was a threat to the stability of the single currency, leading to an unprecedented debate about economic governance in the European Union. At the height of the crisis, some extreme ideas were in circulation, like the demise of the single currency and Greece going bankrupt. In this brief study, Herbert Dieter looks at the major facts in the Greek crisis and how they impacted on the banking system in Germany, the euro and Greece itself. He then looks in detail at the international financial order, considering the emergence of a new order and new rules and examines the role the European Union might play in this connection.
(JD)
*** ROBERT JABLON, LAURE QUENNOUELLE-CORRE, ANDRE STRAUS: Politique et finance à travers l'Europe du XXe siècle. Entretiens avec Robert Jablon. Presses Interuniversitaires Européennes/Peter Lang (see above). "Enjeux internationaux" series, No. 7. 2009, 399 pp, €47.50.
ISBN 978-90-5201-543-9.
This book is as unusual as its is captivating. Why? Because it recounts the life of a character from a novel, who is, as is rarely the case, perfectly real. This character takes the flesh and blood, however, of various individuals, including two historians specialising in the world of finance, who were the character's accomplices in the writing of this book. In the interviews and the pages that collect the sap from the heart of the matter, unfolds the story of a German Jew, Jablonski, born in Paris in 1909, who returns to the fold of his mother's family in Darmstadt, then the capital of the Grand Duchy of Hesse, where he discovers the inconveniences of dual French and German identity. He studied law and gets involved in politics in a secret far-left organisation fighting for unity of action in the anti-Nazi left. Arrested by the Brownshirts for a while and thrown out of his job as a lawyer in 1933 by anti-Semitic laws, he continues as an activist in the Neu Beginnen movement until he decides that it would be more prudent to leave Germany for Paris (after a detour in Prague). In the City of Light, he meets Germaine de Rothschild who was then setting up the Comité Israélite Français Pour les Enfants d'Allemagne et d'Europe Centrale. He becomes the committee's secretary general. When the war starts, he goes back to his resistance activities. Upon Liberation, he changes his name to Robert Jablon and works for thirty years at Rothschild Bank, becoming the manager of it from 1968 to 1978. It is the story of this unusual life that sheds light on the activity of this business bank and the group that is related in these pages, the two accomplices adding to the eyewitness accounts of Robert Jablon, who died in 2008, some very useful historical explanations.
(PBo)
*** PASCAL LELE: Après la crise des subprimes: le nouveau partenariat social. Performance opérationnelle: réduction des pertes, prévention des risques psychosociaux et bonus/Volume 2: Industries. Peter Lang (1 Moosstrasse, Postfach 350, CH-2542 Pieterlen, Switzerland. Tel: (41-32) 3761717 - Fax: 376727 - E-mail: info@peterlang.com - Internet: http://www.peterlang.com ). 2010, 387 pp, €60. ISBN 978-3-0343-0339-2.
Enterprise risk management received glowing accolades for corporate accounting and risk assessment (internal and external clients) at the G20 summit in Pittsburgh. Pay must now be linked to individual, team and group performance, whilst bonuses will have to be related to capitalisation requirements: undercapitalised companies will be required by their national regulators to limit bonus payouts. This publication is by a university professor in management accounting and psycho-sociology, who is also an expert in the dynamics defining organisations. This book is exclusively aimed at experts in the field and reveals (drawing on the experience of car manufacturers and component part suppliers) the internal practices involved in the dynamic accounting of Governance, Risk and Compliance, to achieve this objective. In this book, the author advocates, in particular, global remuneration budgets and bonuses based on “common maximum rewards” as opposed to “maximum individual rewards”. According to the author, this approach is particularly effective for preventing psycho-social risk such as burnout, stress, workplace suffering and harassment etc. This volume focuses on companies operating on the markets, SMEs and public sector companies. The first volume focused on credit institutions, investment and insurance companies.
(PBo)
*** European View. EUROPE 2020 and beyond. Editions Springer (7 Haberstrasse, D-69126 Heidelberg, Germany. Tel: (49-6221) 345-4304 - Fax: 345-4229 - Email: subscriptions@springer.com - Internet: http://www.springer.com ). June 2010, 127 pp.
This is the new issue of European View, the Centre for European Studies' publication. The title does not actually reveal that this publication is actually produced by the official reflection group of the European People's Party. The Centre for European Studies was set up as an intellectual platform for political leaders, opinion makers and academics. It seeks to provide a Christian Democratic colouring to important areas of European and international policy and in each issue of the publication, it focuses on a specific theme. The specific characteristic of the publication is that it seeks to blend the contributions of academics and experts with those expressed by renowned political leaders or other decision-makers. This issue focuses on the theme of the 2020 horizon and the challenges facing the Union between now, then and beyond. The current crisis and the different solutions for tackling it are examined. Particularly important articles have been written by figures such as Wilfried Martens, president of the EPP, president José Manuel Barroso and the former Spanish prime minister, José Maria Aznar. Each of them propose a variety of possibilities for restoring economic growth and ensuring that this growth is stable and sustainable, as well as being able to resist the foibles of the market… over the following decades. The publication looks at questions involving the energy and environment arenas and then proposes a number of ideas and strategies to adopt in an effort to strengthen Europe's position on the world stage.
(NDu)
*** BERNARD DEFLESSELLES: L'état du programme Galileo. Commission des Affaires européennes de l'Assemblée nationale (Boutique de l'Assemblée nationale, 7 rue Aristide Briand, F-75007 Paris. Tel: (33-1) 40630033 - Internet: http://www.assemblee-nationale.fr ). "Rapport d'information" series, No. 2142. 2009, 48 pp, €3.50. ISBN 978-2-11-125874-7.
This information report provides an update on “Galileo…a programme, which manages to make progress, after solving each successive crisis". The French MEP who wrote this, analyses the characteristics and causes of these crises, which are the source of rising costs, delays and other difficulties.
(MT)
*** HENRI CAPRON, DIDIER BAUDEWYNS, MARIE DEPELCHIN: Les Etablissements scientifiques fédéraux. Editions de l'Université de Bruxelles (26 av. Paul Héger, B-1000 Brussels, Tel: (32-2) 6503799 - Fax: 6503794 - editions@admin.ulb.ac.be - Internet: http://www.editions-universite-bruxelles.be/ ). "Economie" series. 2010, 246 pp. €30. ISBN 978-2-8004-1488-1.
This publication provides an insight into a far-reaching analysis by researchers into the cultural, scientific, social and economic impact of the ten establishments covered by federal scientific policy in Belgium, ranging from the Royal Meteorological Institute to the Royal Library and several other museums. The different authors illustrate that far from being on the edge of the financial abyss, which certain rumours in the public domain would have us believe, these establishments bring more to the public good than they actually cost. (PBo)