AJIL Unbound (Jan 2017)
Monetary Unions, Regional Financial Arrangements, and Central Bank Swap Lines: Bypasses to the International Monetary Fund?
Abstract
The situation calls for international cooperation, and all the parties at the Bretton Woods Conference understood this. A pool of international reserves that was readily accessible under mutually agreed upon rules by its members would be a “global public good,” providing considerable efficiency over having all countries solely hold their own stock of international reserves. Since balance of payments shocks are typically asynchronous across countries and over time, the principles of pooling and insurance would assure a net gain from the arrangement.