Macroeconomic Paradigms and Economic Policy From the Great Depression to the Great Recession

The recent financial crisis has demonstrated the dangers of ignoring the factors that led to previous crises, and the effectiveness of the policies designed to deal with them. Over time, these macroeconomic policies have evolved, oscillating between state intervention and a free-market approach. Following a story that runs from the pre-Great Depression era up until the Financial Crisis of 2007–11, this book reveals an intimate connection between new macroeconomic ideas and policies and the events in the real economy that inspired them. It does this in an accessible, easy-to-follow style, first by focusing on the developments of economic theories and policies, and then by concentrating on the design of domestic and international institutions and economic governance. Written by three leading experts on the history of economic policy, the book is ideal for graduates and undergraduates studying macroeconomics, monetary policy and the history of economic thought.

Preface; Acknowledgements; 1. Introduction; 2. The dawn of the Keynesian Age; 3. The Phillips curve menu; 4. The pro-market counterattack: powerless economic policies; 5. Rethinking stabilization policies: good policies or good luck?; 6. The great recession and beyond; 7. Central banking; 8. Fiscal regimes and fiscal policies; 9. Further policy challenges; 10. Conflicts and cooperation in the labor markets; 11. Fixed exchange rates: the age of tempered liberalism; 12. Free to float: the age of neo-liberalism; 13. A fragile European construction: the perils of incomplete coordination; 14. Taking stock: the end of a ride or the start of a new one?; Bibliography.

Nicola Acocella is Emeritus Professor of Economic Policy at the Sapienza University of Rome. He has previously published three books with Cambridge University Press: The Foundations of Economic Policy (1998), Economic Policy in the Age of Globalization (2010), and The Theory of Economic Policy in a Strategic Context (2012) with Giovanni Di Bartolomeo and Andrew Hughes Hallett.
Giovanni Di Bartolomeo is Associate Professor of Economic Policy at the Sapienza University of Rome. He is an active policy advisor for the Italian Ministry of Economics, where he contributes to build and estimate the DSGE model of the Department of Treasury. In 2012, he published The Theory of Economic Policy in a Strategic Context (Cambridge) with Nicola Acocella and Andrew Hughes Hallett.
Andrew Hughes Hallett is Professor of Economics at the University of St Andrews, University Professor at the George Mason University, Virginia, and a Fellow of the Royal Society of Edinburgh. He has published papers in leading economics journals, as well as in mathematics, political science and history, and is ranked in the top half percent of economists by publications worldwide.