IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/a/taf/rripxx/v23y2016i4p583-613.html
   My bibliography  Save this article

Atlas constrained: the US external balance sheet and international monetary power

Author

Listed:
  • Iain Hardie
  • Sylvia Maxfield

Abstract

We address the impact on international monetary power of the size and nature of the US's international financial assets and liabilities. Financial globalization makes critical a focus on a nation's international financial assets and liabilities, its ‘external balance sheet’. We suggest an expansion of Cohen's existing framework of international monetary power to include the implications of valuation changes in these external balance sheets, focusing on sources of valuation, sensitivity and vulnerability of the US economy to these changes and implications for US ability to use monetary statecraft. By focusing on developments since 2007 and on events over the financial crisis period, we show that the increased size and nature of the US's external balance sheet has reduced US autonomy and monetary power. Underpinning the changes in the US's external balance sheet are activities of private financial market actors whose influence in international monetary affairs has grown markedly.

Suggested Citation

  • Iain Hardie & Sylvia Maxfield, 2016. "Atlas constrained: the US external balance sheet and international monetary power," Review of International Political Economy, Taylor & Francis Journals, vol. 23(4), pages 583-613, July.
    • Handle: RePEc:taf:rripxx:v:23:y:2016:i:4:p:583-613
    DOI: 10.1080/09692290.2016.1176587
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: http://hdl.handle.net/10.1080/09692290.2016.1176587
    Download Restriction: Access to full text is restricted to subscribers.
    File URL: https://libkey.io/10.1080/09692290.2016.1176587?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
    ---><---

    As the access to this document is restricted, you may want to search for a different version of it.

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Eswar S. Prasad, 2015. "The Dollar Trap: How the U.S. Dollar Tightened Its Grip on Global Finance," Economics Books, Princeton University Press, edition 1, volume 1, number 10182-2.
    2. Eichengreen, Barry, 2012. "Exorbitant Privilege: The Rise and Fall of the Dollar," OUP Catalogue, Oxford University Press, number 9780199642472.
    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. Ingrid Hjertaker & Bent Sofus Tranøy, 2022. "The Dollar as a Mutual Problem: New Transatlantic Interdependence in Finance," Politics and Governance, Cogitatio Press, vol. 10(2), pages 198-207.
    2. Schwartz, Herman M., 2024. "Triffin reloaded: The matrix of contradictions around global quasi-state money," MPIfG Discussion Paper 24/3, Max Planck Institute for the Study of Societies.
    3. Mathis L Richtmann & Lea Steininger, 2023. "From bazooka to backstop: the political economy of standing swap facilities," Cambridge Journal of Economics, Cambridge Political Economy Society, vol. 47(4), pages 681-702.
    4. Artem E. Anilov & Irina V. Ivashkovskaya, 2018. "Do Boards Of Directors Affect CEO Behavior? Evidence From Payout Decisions," HSE Working papers WP BRP 69/FE/2018, National Research University Higher School of Economics.

    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. Eichengreen, Barry & Flandreau, Marc & Mehl, Arnaud & Chitu, Livia, 2017. "International Currencies Past, Present, and Future: Two Views from Economic History," OUP Catalogue, Oxford University Press, number 9780190659455.
    2. McCauley, Robert N., 2015. "Does the US dollar confer an exorbitant privilege?," Journal of International Money and Finance, Elsevier, vol. 57(C), pages 1-14.
    3. Ethan Ilzetzki & Carmen M Reinhart & Kenneth S Rogoff, 2020. "Why is the euro punching below its weight?," Economic Policy, CEPR, CESifo, Sciences Po;CES;MSH, vol. 35(103), pages 405-460.
    4. Bahaj, Saleem, 2020. "Jumpstarting an International Currency," CEPR Discussion Papers 14793, C.E.P.R. Discussion Papers.
    5. He, Dong & Yu, Xiangrong, 2016. "Network effects in currency internationalisation: Insights from BIS triennial surveys and implications for the renminbi," Journal of International Money and Finance, Elsevier, vol. 68(C), pages 203-229.
    6. Paweł Kowalewski & Dominik Skopiec, 2023. "Wzrost znaczenia złota w rezerwach dewizowych banków centralnych gospodarek wschodzących," Bank i Kredyt, Narodowy Bank Polski, vol. 54(3), pages 259-284.
    7. Hélène Rey, 2016. "International Channels of Transmission of Monetary Policy and the Mundellian Trilemma," IMF Economic Review, Palgrave Macmillan;International Monetary Fund, vol. 64(1), pages 6-35, May.
    8. Mr. Camilo E Tovar Mora & Tania Mohd Nor, 2018. "Reserve Currency Blocs: A Changing International Monetary System?," IMF Working Papers 2018/020, International Monetary Fund.
    9. Ponsot, Jean-François, 2016. "The “four I's” of the international monetary system and the international role of the euro," Research in International Business and Finance, Elsevier, vol. 37(C), pages 299-308.
    10. De Bromhead, Alan & Jordan, David & Kennedy, Francis & Seddon, Jack, 2021. "How does international monetary leadership end? The Sterling Area revisited," QUCEH Working Paper Series 21-02, Queen's University Belfast, Queen's University Centre for Economic History.
    11. Alan de Bromhead & David Jordan & Francis Kennedy & Jack Seddon, 2023. "Sterling's farewell symphony: The end of the Sterling Area revisited," Economic History Review, Economic History Society, vol. 76(2), pages 415-444, May.
    12. José Antonio Ocampo, 2017. "Resetting the International Monetary (Non)System," Books, Red Investigadores de Economía, number 2017-11, May.
    13. D. Essers & E. Vincent, 2017. "The global financial safety net :In need of repair ?," Economic Review, National Bank of Belgium, issue ii, pages 87-112, september.
    14. Jonathan Kirshner, 2014. "Same as it ever was? Continuity and change in the international monetary system," Review of International Political Economy, Taylor & Francis Journals, vol. 21(5), pages 1007-1016, October.
    15. Hager, Sandy Brian, 2016. "Public Debt, Inequality and Power. The Making of a Modern Debt State," EconStor Books, ZBW - Leibniz Information Centre for Economics, number 157976, December.
    16. Reiss, Daniel Gersten, 2014. "Invoice Currency in Brazil," MPRA Paper 59412, University Library of Munich, Germany.
    17. Mika Nieminen, 2017. "Patterns of international capital flows and their implications for developing countries," WIDER Working Paper Series wp-2017-171, World Institute for Development Economic Research (UNU-WIDER).
    18. Pilar Piqué, 2016. "La jerarquía de monedas nacionales y los problemas financieros actuales," Revista de Economía Institucional, Universidad Externado de Colombia - Facultad de Economía, vol. 18(34), pages 69-85, January-J.
    19. Masahiro Kawai, 2014. "Asian Monetary Integration : A Japanese Perspective," Governance Working Papers 24158, East Asian Bureau of Economic Research.
    20. Marcel Fratzscher & Arnaud Mehl, 2014. "China's Dominance Hypothesis and the Emergence of a Tri‐polar Global Currency System," Economic Journal, Royal Economic Society, vol. 124(581), pages 1343-1370, December.

    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:taf:rripxx:v:23:y:2016:i:4:p:583-613. 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: Chris Longhurst (email available below). General contact details of provider: http://www.tandfonline.com/rrip20 .

    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.