Fixed Exchange Rate Regimes
Hall of mirrors?

The many proposals to reform the international monetary system all involve a return to some form of greater fixity of exchange rates. In Discussion Paper No. 282, Research Fellow Alberto Giovannini discusses the institutional aspects of fixed exchange rate systems and the empirical evidence that such regimes work asymmetrically, with one country providing the nominal anchor for the whole system; he examines the experience of the International Gold Standard, the Bretton Woods system and the EMS.
This is a revised version of a paper presented at the September CEPR conference on `International Regimes and Macroeconomic Policy', reported in this Bulletin. Alberto Giovannini also discussed this research at a November lunchtime meeting, which will be reported in Bulletin No. 30

How Do Fixed-Exchange-Rates Regimes Work: The Evidence from the Gold Standard,
Bretton Woods and the EMS
Alberto Giovannini

Discussion Paper No. 282, October 1988 (IM)