Description
This is an impressive and original work. Steven Bryan synthesizes an enormous amount of reading about late-nineteenth and early-twentieth century monetary and economic history and uses it to create an interesting and attractive frame for his own original research. I have rarely seen the much praised ideal of transnational history so fully achieved. -- Mark Metzler, University of Texas at Austin Literature on the gold standard tends to be dominated by Europeans, economists, and the late-nineteenth century. Steven Bryan's study, by shifting the focus to the mid-nineteenth century, power politics, and Argentina and Japan, reminds us that this is only part of the story. His new perspective provokes new thoughts. -- Barry Eichengreen, Univesity of California, Berkeley This masterful account follows in the footsteps of seminal works by Robert Triffin and Barry Eichengreen, who convincingly demonstrated the wide gulf between the 'myth and realities' of the operation of the gold standard in core countries. Bryan challenges the conventional 'sound money' wisdom as recently applied to peripheral or developing countries. Through in-depth case studies of Argentina and Japan, he reaches the paradoxical conclusion that decisive political support for the gold standard came from ardent nationalists in pursuit of 'neo-mercantile,' not liberal, political economic agendas. His findings also caution against a dogmatic adherence to the monetary straightjacket of the gold standard and its modern-day variants. Drawing on an impressive range of theoretical perspectives and primary sources, Bryan has crafted a richly documented, analytically informed global history as seen from the periphery-not just core regions. -- David F. Weiman, Barnard College
About the Author
Steven Bryan is an attorney in Tokyo. He received his Ph.D. in history from Columbia University and his J.D. from Harvard Law School. His next project is a comparative history of Japan in the 1920s and 1990s.
Reviews
A welcome addiction to the work focusing on experience outside the European core to the gold standard world. -- Kenneth Moure Journal of World History
Book Information
ISBN 9780231152525
Author Steven Bryan
Format Hardback
Page Count 288
Imprint Columbia University Press
Publisher Columbia University Press