From convoy to parting ways? Post-crisis divergence between European and US macroeconomic Policies

/ Home
/ Publications

Working paper

From convoy to parting ways? Post-crisis divergence between European and US macroeconomic Policies

Publishing date: 15 February 2011
Authors: Jean Pisani-Ferry Adam Posen

Download

The response in 2008-09 to the global financial crisis was in many ways a high water mark for transatlantic policy coordination. The major economies of the EU and the US rapidly agreed on a series of measures to limit the crisis. However, the common approach has since unraveled. This paper explores why the London consensus has not survived for much more than a year.
In response to this situation this working paper suggests a critical quantum of coordination. Key measures include a commitment to avoiding deliberate currency depreciation and unilateral intervention; agreement to give the IMF an enhanced monitoring role; the adoption by parliaments of medium-term fiscal plans ; and cooperation on the issue of Chinese undervaluation.

About the authors

Jean Pisani-Ferry

Jean Pisani-Ferry is a Senior Fellow at Bruegel, the European think tank, and a Non-Resident Senior Fellow at the Peterson Institute (Washington DC). He is also a professor of economics with Sciences Po (Paris).

He sits on the supervisory board of the French Caisse des Dépôts and serves as non-executive chair of I4CE, the French institute for climate economics.

Pisani-Ferry served from 2013 to 2016 as Commissioner-General of France Stratégie, the ideas lab of the French government. In 2017, he contributed to Emmanuel Macron’s presidential bid as the Director of programme and ideas of his campaign. He was from 2005 to 2013 the Founding Director of Bruegel, the Brussels-based economic think tank that he had contributed to create. Beforehand, he was Executive President of the French PM’s Council of Economic Analysis (2001-2002), Senior Economic Adviser to the French Minister of Finance (1997-2000), and Director of CEPII, the French institute for international economics (1992-1997).

Pisani-Ferry has taught at University Paris-Dauphine, École Polytechnique, École Centrale and the Free University of Brussels. His publications include numerous books and articles on economic policy and European policy issues. He has also been an active contributor to public debates with regular columns in Le Monde and for Project Syndicate.
Adam Posen

Adam S. Posen is the president of the

.

Adam Posen is President of the Peterson Institute for International Economics. From 2009-12, during the global financial crisis, he served as an external voting member of the Bank of England’s Monetary Policy Committee, and was a globally recognized advocate of activist macroeconomic policy response to the crisis. He is the author or editor of six books, and has served as a visiting scholar or consultant to central banks throughout Europe, North America, and East Asia. He is in his fifth term as an Economic Advisor to the US Congressional Budget Office. He received his PhD in Political Economy from Harvard University, and has been the recipient of fellowships and major research grants from the European Commission, the Ford Foundation, the Sloan Foundation, and the US National Science Foundation.