Alvaro Cencini is Professor of Monetary Economics at the Centre for Banking Studies and at the University della Svizzera Italiana, Lugano, Switzerland. He is also a member of the Centre d’études monétaires et financières at the University of Bourgogne, France.

• Introduction Part I Money, production and the banking system 1 ON MONEY 2 THE MONETARY SYSTEM AND THE CENTRAL BANK 3 NATIONAL MONETARY DISEQUILIBRIA: INFLATION4 NATIONAL MONETARY DISEQUILIBRIA: DEFLATION 5 THE MONETARY INTERVENTION OF CENTRAL BANKS Part II Money and international transactions 6 INTERNATIONAL PAYMENTS WITHIN THE GOLD STANDARD AND THE GOLD-EXCHANGE STANDARD 7 INTERNATIONAL LIQUIDITY: PROBLEMS AND ATTEMPTED SOLUTIONS 8 THE INTERNATIONAL PAYMENTS PROBLEM AND THE BALANCE OF PAYMENTS 9 THE EXCHANGE RATES PROBLEM 10 TOWARDS A NEW SOLUTION TO THE CRISIS OF INTERNATIONAL PAYMENTS? 11 THE PROBLEM OF EUROPEAN MONETARY UNIFICATION 12 MONETARY HOMOGENEITY AND MONETARY SOVEREIGNTY: TWO COMPATIBLE OBJECTIVES 13 THE EXTERNAL DEBT PROBLEM 14 THE CONSEQUENCES OF EXTERNAL DEBT SERVICING 15 ELEMENTS FOR A SOLUTION TO THE EXTERNAL DEBT PROBLEM