The Economic Contributions of Robert A. Mundell

This is the second in a series of articles surveying the contributions of recent recipients of the Nobel Memorial Prize in Economics. The 1999 recipient of the prize, Robert A. Mundell, has made important contributions in several fields, including the theory of the monetary and fiscal policy mix, the monetary approach to the balance of payments, the theory of optimal currency areas and supply-side economics. This paper provides an overview and critical evaluation of these contributions.     

亚洲货币问题——罗伯特·蒙代尔教授中南财经政法大学演讲观点概述

2006年10月13日上午,1999年诺贝尔经济学奖获得者、美国哥伦比亚大学教授、中南财经政法大学名誉教授罗伯特·蒙代尔(Robert Mundell)在中南财经政法大学首义校区大礼堂,以“亚洲货币问题”(Asian Currency Issue)为主题,给师生们作了一场精彩的学术报告。蒙代尔教授在演讲中阐     

Overturning Mundell: Fiscal Policy in a Monetary Union

Central to ongoing debates over the desirability of monetary unions is a supposed trade-off, outlined by Mundell (1961) : a monetary union reduces transactions costs but renders stabilization policy less effective. If shocks across countries are sufficiently correlated, then, according to this argument, delegating monetary policy to a single central bank is not very costly and a monetary union is desirable.
This paper explores this argument in a setting with both monetary and fiscal policies. In an economy with monetary policy alone, we confirm the presence of the trade-off and find that indeed a monetary union will not be welfare improving if the correlation of national shocks is too low. However, fiscal interventions by national governments, combined with a central bank that has the ability to commit to monetary policy, overturn these results. In equilibrium, such a monetary union will be welfare improving for any correlation of shocks.     

罗伯特·达尔经济民主思想述评

文章对罗伯特·达尔的经济民主思想做了初步述评。达尔认为,经济民主可以进一步地推动政治民主,解决多元民主的某些弊病。但是经济民主可能与政治民主的某些价值相冲突,而且它自身的实现也有许多困难。     

Thomas Robert Malthus and Samuel Hollander: A Review

In large part we follow the order of Hollander's text, ¹ and page references to Hollander are given by [H, p()]. References to Malthus are from The Works as edited by E. A. Wrigley and David Souden,² and are given by [M, (vol. no.), (abbreviated title of volume), (p())].     

Mundell Revisited: a Simple Approach to the Costs and Benefits of a Single Currency Area

The paper evaluates the costs and benefits of a single currency area within a unified framework. Conventionally, it is argued that a single currency area carries a welfare loss owing to the sacrifice of exchange rate adjustment in the presence of country‐specific shocks. But in 1973 Mundell argued that a single currency area offers risk‐sharing benefits when capital markets are limited in their ability to facilitate consumption insurance. The authors construct a simple model and compare a system of independent national currencies to a single currency area. The presence of country‐specific shocks may either reduce or enhance the benefits of a single currency area, depending on the importance of exchange rate adjustment relative to risk‐sharing. In a simple quantitative analysis, we find that either regime may dominate, although the utility differences between the two regimes are very small.     

Against Decadence: The Work of Robert A. Brady (1901-63)

Research on institutional change has flourished ever since the debate on agency and structure has moved away from the previously uncompromising positions in which either agency or structure was emphasized. A conceptual compromise is sought here in a focus on the processes of institutionalization, which allows one to move beyond the idea that institutions are mere mental constructs or the point of view that behavior is the mere reproduction of institutional patterns. Contributing to an understanding of the processes of institutional change, this paper analyzes institutional change as instigated by tensions, triggered by agents’ discrepancies berween concrete institutional settings and the socio-economic values these are to represent. The Social Value Nexus that is presented introduces an emphasis on the perceived legitimacy of institutions. Describing (types of) tensions berween socio-cultural values and institutional settings, the paper explores how structure, agency and values interact in processes of institutional change.