Premium
The parliamentary scrutiny of euro area national central banks
Author(s) -
Högenauer AnnaLena,
Howarth David
Publication year - 2019
Publication title -
public administration
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
SCImago Journal Rank - 1.313
H-Index - 93
eISSN - 1467-9299
pISSN - 0033-3298
DOI - 10.1111/padm.12576
Subject(s) - scrutiny , independence (probability theory) , context (archaeology) , parliament , political science , politics , political economy , european union , public administration , law , economics , economic policy , geography , statistics , mathematics , archaeology
European Economic and Monetary Union (EMU) involves several core principles for the organization of participating national central banks (NCBs/CBs), including their independence from political institutions. Early studies show that the level of national parliamentary scrutiny over euro area NCBs varied (Lepper and Sterne 2002). In this context, our article examines the extent to which parliaments make use of four distinct control mechanisms to hold CBs accountable. We explain the very different levels of parliamentary scrutiny over NCBs in Germany, France and Belgium during the 2013–16 period. We find that the level of scrutiny depends principally on the presence of a longstanding tradition of CB independence—and specifically the manner in which independence has been politicized and interpreted by the political class. We argue that the strength of the parliament can also explain some variation.