Banking Supervision in Conditions of Deregulation and Globalization

Abstract

Far from being a new phenomenon, financial crises, which have received so much attention in recent years, have been a regular feature of the international economy every time that the nation states have opened their economies to trade and capital flows with other countries (cf. Kindleberger 1978b, Sprague 1910). What is new about the crises since the 1970s is their frequency and size, both of which have increased markedly over the period. Nor has this been confined to a few countries. The crises have involved banks from industrial, developing and transition economies, and from countries in virtually every part of the world.

This chapter was written in 1999. It was funded by the Department for International Development (DFID) as part of UK Government’s bilateral programme of technical assistance for the countries of Central and Eastern Europe. The views expressed are those of the author and should not, therefore, be attributed to the DFID or any other organization.