The creation of the Bank for International Settlements (BIS) in 1929 to deal with the settlement of First World War reparations payments was seen by central banks as an opportunity to put international cooperation on an institutional footing. Their initial vision of what the BIS might achieve in support of the gold exchange standard was ambitious. In the view of Montagu Norman and Hjalmar Schacht, the BIS needed to become a forum not merely for information exchange and for refining the techniques of managing the gold exchange standard, but a truly cooperative organisation capable of providing support to central banks in emergencies and for developing new financial arrangements. This chapter investigates the scope of the Norman-Schacht vision, as well as attempts to put this vision into practice (e.g. through the BIS study committee on medium-term credits, or through the BIS-coordinated interventions in the Austrian banking and financial crisis of May-June 1931). Based on research in the historical archives of the BIS, this chapter assesses whether the Norman-Schacht vision for the BIS failed because of differences in policies and goals among the central banks, or rather because of the disruptive effects of the Great Depression.

After his formal PhD, from 1936-1942 Kindleberger continued his education as a central bank staffer, absorbing the key currency approach of John H. Williams at the New York Fed, critically engaging the monetarist approach of Per Jacobsson at the BIS, and then enthusiastically signing on for the globalist vision of Alvin Hansen at the Board of Governors.

This chapter, devoted to the events of 1929–30, opens three chapters – Chapters 3–5 – which analyse collectively the Morgan role in the coming and development of the Depression between 1929 and 1933. Chapter 3 has as its centrepiece the Morgan effort to end what the partners saw as postwar economic warfare that was undermining European and, by extension, American prosperity. The concrete form that this took was the Young Plan (1929) that revised reparation as well as the establishment of the Bank for International Settlements, conceived as a forum to allow central banks to overcome pressing international questions. The Wall Street Crash, which surprised the Morgan partners – they did not see it coming – was, in the Morgan view, ephemeral. This stance helps us understand why Wall Street was slow to appreciate the downturn. The chapter argues that there was division among the Morgan partners as 1930 progressed on the state of the American and global economy. Leffingwell, the partnership economist, was pessimistic by the summer of 1930. In contrast Lamont continued to evince an optimistic outlook, driven in part by his desire to remain in step with the Hoover administration.

Based on a thorough analysis of the BIS Annual Reports from the early 1970s to the late 2010s, this chapter traces the evolution of the BIS’s thinking on the international monetary and financial system. It demonstrates how – as a result of the growth of the Eurocurrency markets in the 1970s and of the sovereign debt crisis of the 1980s – the BIS’s traditional focus on exchange rates and their potential impact on monetary stability gradually shifted to global capital flows and to the risks posed by an increasingly complex and interconnected banking system. The 1995 Mexico crisis and 1997–8 Asian crisis reinforced this shift and led to an overriding concern with the procyclicality of the financial system as a potential threat to financial stability. While recognising that the focus of the BIS on a macro-financial stability framework has contributed a lot to advancing the work of the Basel-based committees and standard-setting bodies, the chapter also concludes that not much progress has been made in coordinating monetary policies or in addressing the fundamental problem of excessive elasticity of the financial system.

This chapter traces the origins of the European monetary unification project. The 1957 Treaty of Rome called for monetary policy coordination within the EEC. To achieve this, a committee of governors of the EEC central banks was created (1964). The governors chose the BIS in Basel as their meeting place to underline their independence from the EEC in Brussels. In the 1970s, after the breakdown of the Bretton Woods system of fixed exchange rates, the committee played a key role in the attempts to restore stable exchange rates within Europe, leading to the creation of the European Monetary System (EMS). In 1988–9, the BIS hosted the Delors Committee for the study of monetary union in Europe. The conclusions of the Delors Committee provided the basis of the 1992 Maastricht Treaty, which set the EU on the path of monetary union. Once this decision had been taken, the role of the BIS as host and agent of the EMS came to an end, and the committee of governors – soon recreated as the European Monetary Institute (EMI) and then European Central Bank (ECB) – moved from Basel to Frankfurt. The chapter ends with an assessment of the euro crisis of 2011–12.

This chapter discusses the transformation of the Bank for International Settlements from a predominantly European organisation into a truly global one. This transformation coincided with, and was the result of, the rapid rise in prominence of the emerging-market economies, particularly from the 1990s. Until the mid-1990s the BIS, although serving the global central banking community, was in terms of governance and organisation strongly dominated by the Group of Ten advanced industrial countries. Because of history and statutory constraints – but also because the G10 very much valued their close cooperation – this changed only gradually. The chapter outlines in detail how and why the BIS first expanded its shareholding membership and only then its internal governance structure to become truly representative of the global economy. The great financial crisis of 2007–8 further accelerated this process, which was basically concluded by the end of the 2010s, with all major central banks being represented on the BIS Board of Directors.

This chapter is a reflection or insider’s view provided by a former President of the Federal Reserve Bank of New York and long-standing member of the BIS Board of Directors, William Dudley. Based on his first-hand experience, and in reference to the crucial decade following the global financial crisis of 2007–9, his contribution reflects on the usefulness of the BIS as the global cooperative organisation of central banks. The BIS continues to play a crucial role as a forum for information exchange and discussions among central bankers and for informal networking. In addition, through its research, meetings and policy work it enables international consensus-building with a view to promoting global financial stability. The contribution also identifies some areas in which the BIS can and should further improve, in particular in terms of its transparency, diversity and inclusiveness. The efficient coordination of work and the ongoing cooperation between the BIS and the other key stakeholders in the international financial system, in particular the IMF and the World Bank, also figures high on the agenda.

This chapter provides an historical account of why the institutional setting of the BIS has been conducive to the emergence of soft law as a critical tool for managing the global financial system. Soft law developed almost naturally at the BIS as a result of the many technocratic issues it was called on to deal with throughout its long history – be it German reparation payments in the 1930s, the management of the Bretton Woods system of fixed exchange rates in the 1960s or growing financial stability concerns in the 1970s and 1980s and beyond. The Basel I Capital Accord, adopted in 1988, was a political and regulatory watershed in that respect – a non-binding code of conduct agreed by an informal committee of experts (the Basel Committee on Banking Supervision), that was subsequently implemented by national legislation in all the main constituencies. The chapter argues that the relative success of soft law in financial regulation owes a lot to the particular set-up and traditions of the BIS. However, it concludes that in order to be successful in future, soft law – much like the BIS – will have to become ever more inclusive and transparent.

It is a commonplace to state that we live in a time of continuous change. But that doesn’t make it any less true. The force and impact of change become all the more obvious when considering a horizon that spans two generations. Fifty years ago, a mere handful of advanced industrial economies dominated the global economy. Since then, a wide array of countries have emerged as new economic powerhouses. Economic development and prosperity are now more equally spread across the globe than at any other time over at least the past two centuries.

This chapter discusses the contribution of BIS research to the shift in the way financial stability issues have been looked at before and after the great financial crisis of 2007–9. It also considers the policy implications for the post-crisis reforms. The 1997–8 Asian crisis was an important turning point, focusing BIS research on the endogenous causes of financial instability and thus on the resilience and the risks of the financial system as a whole. From the late 1990s, the BIS started advocating a macroprudential approach to financial stability, including the adoption of countercyclical macroprudential policies. These ideas, while being shared by some academics and central banks, were largely ignored in policy circles, including in the Basel Committee on Banking Supervision. The chapter argues that the great financial crisis of 2007–9 catapulted these same ideas to the top of the reform agenda. Work done previously by the BIS and others, i.a. on the issue of countercyclical capital buffers, could be leveraged and find its way on the reform agenda pushed by the Financial Stability Board and the G20. The ‘measured contrarianism‘ of the BIS in this area thus added real value.

This chapter provides an historical account of why the institutional setting of the BIS has been conducive to the emergence of soft law as a critical tool for managing the global financial system. Soft law developed almost naturally at the BIS as a result of the many technocratic issues it was called on to deal with throughout its long history – be it German reparation payments in the 1930s, the management of the Bretton Woods system of fixed exchange rates in the 1960s or growing financial stability concerns in the 1970s and 1980s and beyond. The Basel I Capital Accord, adopted in 1988, was a political and regulatory watershed in that respect – a non-binding code of conduct agreed by an informal committee of experts (the Basel Committee on Banking Supervision), that was subsequently implemented by national legislation in all the main constituencies. The chapter argues that the relative success of soft law in financial regulation owes a lot to the particular set-up and traditions of the BIS. However, it concludes that in order to be successful in future, soft law – much like the BIS – will have to become ever more inclusive and transparent.