Economists and political scientists have frequently attempted to determine whether trade policy-related political action takes place along factor-lines (such as capital versus labor, as implied by the Stolper-Samuelson theorem) or along industry-lines (as implied by models with imperfect factor...

The international monetary system has passed through a succession of phases characterized alternatively by the dominance of fixed and flexible exchange rates. How are these repeated shifts between fixed and flexible rate regimes to be understood? The present paper specifies and tests six...

Over the past century, the world economy has passed through a succession of phases characterized by very different levels of international capital flows. This paper asks what accounts for these dramatic shifts in the extent of capital movements across national borders, Three categories of...

This paper reports evidence on the characteristics of fixed and flexible exchange rate regimes. It contrasts experience under three interwar exchange rate regimes: the free float of the early 1920s, the fixed rates of 1927-31, and the managed float of the early 1930s. A number of important...

This paper provides an historical perspective on the recent behavior of the U.S. trade deficit. Judged by U.S. historical experience, the trade deficit has reached what is now unprecedented levels. That unprecedented deficit has its principal source not in changes in market structure affecting...

Specialists in international relations have argued that international regimes operate smoothly and exhibit stability only when dominated by a single, exceptionally powerful national economy. In particular, this "theory of hegemonic stability" has been applied to the international monetary...

At the April 2003 meeting of the International Monetary and Financial Committees, it was decided to further encourage the contractual approach to smoothing the process of sovereign debt restructuring by encouraging the more widespread use of collective action clauses (CACs) in international...

We analyze disagreements over de facto exchange-rate-regime classifications using three popular de facto regime data series. While there is a moderate degree of concurrence across classifications, disagreements are not uncommon, and they are not random. They are most prevalent in middle-income...

In this paper we reconsider the evidence on capital account liberalization and growth. While we find indications of a positive association, the effects vary with time, with how capital account liberalization is measured, and with how the relationship is estimated. The evidence that the effects...

In this paper we analyze three views of the relationship between the exchange rate and financial fragility: (1) the moral hazard hypothesis, according to which pegged exchange rates offer implicit insurance against exchange risk and thereby encourage reckless borrowing and lending; (2) the...