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ON THE FEASIBILITY OF A ONE‐SPEED OR MULTISPEED EUROPEAN MONETARY UNION
Author(s) -
ALESINA ALBERTO,
GRILLI VITTORIO
Publication year - 1993
Publication title -
economics and politics
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
SCImago Journal Rank - 0.822
H-Index - 45
eISSN - 1468-0343
pISSN - 0954-1985
DOI - 10.1111/j.1468-0343.1993.tb00072.x
Subject(s) - skepticism , economics , economic and monetary union , european monetary union , politics , european union , monetary hegemony , process (computing) , international economics , political union , keynesian economics , european integration , economy , political economy , political science , monetary policy , law , computer science , philosophy , epistemology , operating system
This paper addresses two questions: (1) Is a twelve‐country monetary union in Europe feasible? (2) Can monetary union be achieved at multispeed, i.e., with a small group of countries going first, and later admitting the others? After examining several politico‐economic arguments concerning problems of feasibility of the union, we conclude with a fair amount of skepticism concerning the multispeed idea. We show that the final result of the process of monetary integration is dependent upon the number of countries that initiate it. Our discussion of feasibility sheds some light on the political economy of the recent (Fall 1992) turmoil in the monetary system of Europe.