IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/a/bla/jcmkts/v58y2020i4p978-998.html
   My bibliography  Save this article

‘We Serve the People of Europe’: Reimagining the ECB's Political Master in the Wake of its Emergency Politics

Author

Listed:
  • Hjalte Lokdam

Abstract

In the wake of the Euro crisis, the mission statement on the European Central Bank's (ECB) website was changed from ‘Our mission is to serve Europe's citizens’ to ‘Our mission is to serve the people of Europe’. This article situates this discursive shift within a broader change of the ECB's self‐presentation in public discourses and explores its meaning in terms of political theory and public law. The article argues that the shift represents a response to the perceived necessity of reimagining the ECB's foundation of legitimate governmental authority following its exercise of emergency powers during the Euro crisis. The discourse emphasizes an organic link between the ECB and ‘the people of Europe’ as a political subject able to authorize previously unauthorized governmental practices such as the outright monetary transactions programme. It reflects, furthermore, a new governing philosophy that stresses flexibility and discretion rather than strict adherence to rules in the ECB's exercise of power.

Suggested Citation

  • Hjalte Lokdam, 2020. "‘We Serve the People of Europe’: Reimagining the ECB's Political Master in the Wake of its Emergency Politics," Journal of Common Market Studies, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 58(4), pages 978-998, July.
    • Handle: RePEc:bla:jcmkts:v:58:y:2020:i:4:p:978-998
    DOI: 10.1111/jcms.13014
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: https://doi.org/10.1111/jcms.13014
    Download Restriction: no
    File URL: https://libkey.io/10.1111/jcms.13014?utm_source=ideas
    LibKey link: if access is restricted and if your library uses this service, LibKey will redirect you to where you can use your library subscription to access this item
    ---><---

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Carlo Altavilla & Domenico Giannone & Michele Lenza, 2016. "The Financial and Macroeconomic Effects of the OMT Announcements," International Journal of Central Banking, International Journal of Central Banking, vol. 12(3), pages 29-57, September.
    2. Blyth, Mark, 2015. "Austerity: The History of a Dangerous Idea," OUP Catalogue, Oxford University Press, number 9780199389445.
    3. Winkler Adalbert, 2015. "The ECB as Lender of Last Resort: Banks versus Governments," Journal of Economics and Statistics (Jahrbuecher fuer Nationaloekonomie und Statistik), De Gruyter, vol. 235(3), pages 329-341, June.
    4. Fraccaroli, Nicolò & Giovannini, Alessandro & Jamet, Jean-Francois, 2018. "The evolution of the ECB’s accountability practices during the crisis," Economic Bulletin Articles, European Central Bank, vol. 5.
    5. Braun, Benjamin, 2016. "Speaking to the people? Money, trust, and central bank legitimacy in the age of quantitative easing," MPIfG Discussion Paper 16/12, Max Planck Institute for the Study of Societies.
    6. Saka, Orkun & Fuertes, Ana-Maria & Kalotychou, Elena, 2015. "ECB policy and Eurozone fragility: Was De Grauwe right?," Journal of International Money and Finance, Elsevier, vol. 54(C), pages 168-185.
    7. Paul De Grauwe, 2013. "The European Central Bank as Lender of Last Resort in the Government Bond Markets," CESifo Economic Studies, CESifo Group, vol. 59(3), pages 520-535, September.
    8. Berger, Allen N. & Molyneux, Philip & Wilson, John O.S. (ed.), 2012. "The Oxford Handbook of Banking," OUP Catalogue, Oxford University Press, number 9780199640935.
    9. Benjamin Braun, 2016. "Speaking to the people? Money, trust, and central bank legitimacy in the age of quantitative easing," Review of International Political Economy, Taylor & Francis Journals, vol. 23(6), pages 1064-1092, November.
    10. Gren, Jakub, 2018. "The Eurosystem and the Single Supervisory Mechanism: institutional continuity under constitutional constraints," Legal Working Paper Series 17, European Central Bank.
    11. Urszula Szczerbowicz, 2015. "The ECB Unconventional Monetary Policies: Have They Lowered Market Borrowing Costs for Banks and Governments?," International Journal of Central Banking, International Journal of Central Banking, vol. 11(4), pages 91-127, December.
    12. Goodhart, Charles A. E., 1998. "The two concepts of money: implications for the analysis of optimal currency areas," European Journal of Political Economy, Elsevier, vol. 14(3), pages 407-432, August.
    Full references (including those not matched with items on IDEAS)

    Citations

    Citations are extracted by the CitEc Project, subscribe to its RSS feed for this item.
    as


    Cited by:

    1. Alan S. Blinder & Michael Ehrmann & Jakob de Haan & David-Jan Jansen, 2024. "Central Bank Communication with the General Public: Promise or False Hope?," Journal of Economic Literature, American Economic Association, vol. 62(2), pages 425-457, June.
    2. Jonathan White, 2023. "Constitutionalizing the EU in an Age of Emergencies," Journal of Common Market Studies, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 61(3), pages 781-796, May.
    3. Stefan Auer & Nicole Scicluna, 2021. "The Impossibility of Constitutionalizing Emergency Europe," Journal of Common Market Studies, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 59(S1), pages 20-31, September.
    4. Jens van ‘t Klooster & Nik de Boer, 2023. "What to Do with the ECB's Secondary Mandate," Journal of Common Market Studies, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 61(3), pages 730-746, May.
    5. Muireann O'Dwyer, 2022. "Gender and Crises in European Economic Governance: Is this Time Different?," Journal of Common Market Studies, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 60(1), pages 152-169, January.

    Most related items

    These are the items that most often cite the same works as this one and are cited by the same works as this one.
    1. Lokdam, Hjalte, 2020. "We serve the people of Europe: reimagining the ECB's political master in the wake of its emergency politics," LSE Research Online Documents on Economics 111873, London School of Economics and Political Science, LSE Library.
    2. Niels Gilbert, 2019. "Euro area sovereign risk spillovers before and after the ECB's OMT announcement," DNB Working Papers 636, Netherlands Central Bank, Research Department.
    3. Diessner, Sebastian & Lisi, Giulio, 2019. "Masters of the ‘masters of the universe’? Monetary, fiscal and financial dominance in the Eurozone," LSE Research Online Documents on Economics 100754, London School of Economics and Political Science, LSE Library.
    4. Corvino, Raffaele & Ruggiero, Francesco, 2021. "The relative pricing of sovereign credit risk after the Eurozone crisis," Journal of International Money and Finance, Elsevier, vol. 112(C).
    5. Christophe Blot & Jérôme Creel & Paul Hubert & Fabien Labondance, 2020. "The role of ECB monetary policy and financial stress on Eurozone sovereign yields," Empirical Economics, Springer, vol. 59(3), pages 1189-1211, September.
    6. Carsten M. Stann & Theocharis N. Grigoriadis, 2020. "Monetary Policy Transmission to Russia and Eastern Europe," Comparative Economic Studies, Palgrave Macmillan;Association for Comparative Economic Studies, vol. 62(2), pages 303-353, June.
    7. Wildmer Daniel Gregori & Wildmer Agnese Sacchi, 2016. "Has the Grexit news spilled over into euro area financial markets? The role of domestic political leaders, supranational executives and institutions," Mo.Fi.R. Working Papers 134, Money and Finance Research group (Mo.Fi.R.) - Univ. Politecnica Marche - Dept. Economic and Social Sciences.
    8. Csaba Lentner & Krisztina Szegedi & Tibor Tatay, 2017. "Social Responsibility in the Operation of Central Banks," Financial and Economic Review, Magyar Nemzeti Bank (Central Bank of Hungary), vol. 16(2), pages 64-85.
    9. Afonso, António & Arghyrou, Michael G. & Gadea, María Dolores & Kontonikas, Alexandros, 2018. "“Whatever it takes” to resolve the European sovereign debt crisis? Bond pricing regime switches and monetary policy effects," Journal of International Money and Finance, Elsevier, vol. 86(C), pages 1-30.
    10. Gregori, Wildmer Daniel & Sacchi, Agnese, 2019. "Has the Grexit news affected euro area financial markets?," The North American Journal of Economics and Finance, Elsevier, vol. 49(C), pages 71-84.
    11. Oussama Kchaou & Makram Bellalah & Sofiane Tahi, 2022. "Transmission of the Greek crisis on the sovereign debt markets in the euro area," Annals of Operations Research, Springer, vol. 313(2), pages 1117-1139, June.
    12. Acharya, Viral & Pierret, Diane & Steffen, Sascha, 2016. "Lender of last resort versus buyer of last resort: The impact of the European Central Bank actions on the bank-sovereign nexus," ZEW Discussion Papers 16-019, ZEW - Leibniz Centre for European Economic Research.
    13. Christophe Blot & Jérôme Creel & Paul Hubert & Fabien Labondance, 2015. "The QE experience: Worth a try?," SciencePo Working papers Main hal-03568216, HAL.
    14. McQuade, Peter & Falagiarda, Matteo & Tirpák, Marcel, 2015. "Spillovers from the ECB's non-standard monetary policies on non-euro area EU countries: evidence from an event-study analysis," Working Paper Series 1869, European Central Bank.
    15. Christophe Blot & Fabien Labondance, 2021. "Beyond the Interest Rate Pass-through: Monetary Policy and Banks Interest Rates during the Effective Lower Bound," Working Papers hal-04221606, HAL.
    16. Donato Masciandaro, 2020. "Covid-19 Helicopter Money, Monetary Policy And Central Bank Independence: Economics And Politics," BAFFI CAREFIN Working Papers 20137, BAFFI CAREFIN, Centre for Applied Research on International Markets Banking Finance and Regulation, Universita' Bocconi, Milano, Italy.
    17. Jorg Bibow, 2015. "The Euro's Savior? Assessing the ECB's Crisis Management Performance and Potential for Crisis Resolution," Economics Working Paper Archive wp_845, Levy Economics Institute.
    18. Neugebauer, Frederik & Russnak, Jan & Zimmermann, Lilli & Camarero Garcia, Sebastian, 2024. "Effects of the ECB’s communication on government bond spreads," Journal of International Money and Finance, Elsevier, vol. 142(C).
    19. Ferrando, Annalisa & Popov, Alexander & Udell, Gregory F., 2022. "Unconventional monetary policy, funding expectations, and firm decisions," European Economic Review, Elsevier, vol. 149(C).
    20. Tarek Chebbi, 2021. "The response of precious metal futures markets to unconventional monetary surprises in the presence of uncertainty," International Journal of Finance & Economics, John Wiley & Sons, Ltd., vol. 26(2), pages 1897-1916, April.

    More about this item

    Statistics

    Access and download statistics

    Corrections

    All material on this site has been provided by the respective publishers and authors. You can help correct errors and omissions. When requesting a correction, please mention this item's handle: RePEc:bla:jcmkts:v:58:y:2020:i:4:p:978-998. See general information about how to correct material in RePEc.

    If you have authored this item and are not yet registered with RePEc, we encourage you to do it here. This allows to link your profile to this item. It also allows you to accept potential citations to this item that we are uncertain about.

    If CitEc recognized a bibliographic reference but did not link an item in RePEc to it, you can help with this form .

    If you know of missing items citing this one, you can help us creating those links by adding the relevant references in the same way as above, for each refering item. If you are a registered author of this item, you may also want to check the "citations" tab in your RePEc Author Service profile, as there may be some citations waiting for confirmation.

    For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its authors, title, abstract, bibliographic or download information, contact: Wiley Content Delivery (email available below). General contact details of provider: http://www.blackwellpublishing.com/journal.asp?ref=0021-9886 .

    Please note that corrections may take a couple of weeks to filter through the various RePEc services.

    IDEAS is a RePEc service. RePEc uses bibliographic data supplied by the respective publishers.