Columbia International Affairs Online: Policy Briefs

CIAO DATE: 11/2010

What kind of governance for the eurozone?

Paul De Grauwe

September 2010

Centre for European Policy Studies

Abstract

Much of the discussion about how to impose more convergence among member states of the eurozone has focused on what national governments should do to avoid divergent developments in a number of macroeconomic variables, e.g. competitiveness or current account imbalances. Without denying that national governments bear part of the responsibility, this paper finds that the role of governments has been over-emphasised and that conversely the role of the monetary authorities, in particular the European Central Bank, has been under-emphasised.