Jérôme Sgard – författare

Until the 1980s, most national economies were characterized by a clear hierarchy of norms both within the legal order and between public and private ordering. Transnational exchange was then governed by inter-governmental agreements aimed at articulating these national economic systems and associated public and private norms. Since then, this governance regime has experienced massive changes. A great number of new norm-makers and intermediaries now shape the incentives and sanctions that govern economic behaviors, resulting in complexity, unpredictability, inconsistencies, and innovations.The Handbook addresses this complexity, through expert analysis and case studies from a multidisciplinary team of economists, sociologists, political scientists, international political economy specialists and historians. The volume is organized around the logic of questioning how international systems of exchange work. In the first section, the authors explore the micro foundation of cross border exchange and transnational contracts by analyzing how private ordering, networks of agents, along with governments and officials build and regulate (imperfect) markets. The discussion then explores the challenges of compliance with those norms and regulations, highlighting how market discipline and judicial sanctions combine, and how a “rule of law” tends to develop at the international level. The next section studies the governmental initiatives to organize markets and fix market failures in a world characterized by political fragmentation and imbalance amongst governments, and also between states and non-governmental actors. Finally, there's consideration of new modes of law-making, new forms of adjudication and dispute settlement, new vectors of accountability and of guarantee of commitments that combine to initiate emerging models of governance, which co-exist with traditional ones.

Until the 1980s, most national economies were characterized by a clear hierarchy of norms both within the legal order and between public and private ordering. Transnational exchange was then governed by inter-governmental agreements aimed at articulating these national economic systems and associated public and private norms. Since then, this governance regime has experienced massive changes. A great number of new norm-makers and intermediaries now shape the incentives and sanctions that govern economic behaviors, resulting in complexity, unpredictability, inconsistencies, and innovations. The Handbook addresses this complexity, through expert analysis and case studies from a multidisciplinary team of economists, sociologists, political scientists, international political economy specialists and historians. The volume is organized around the logic of questioning how international systems of exchange work. In the first section, the authors explore the micro foundation of cross border exchange and transnational contracts by analyzing how private ordering, networks of agents, along with governments and officials build and regulate (imperfect) markets. The discussion then explores the challenges of compliance with those norms and regulations, highlighting how market discipline and judicial sanctions combine, and how a rule of law tends to develop at the international level. The next section studies the governmental initiatives to organize markets and fix market failures in a world characterized by political fragmentation and imbalance amongst governments, and also between states and non-governmental actors. Finally, there's consideration of new modes of law-making, new forms of adjudication and dispute settlement, new vectors of accountability and of guarantee of commitments that combine to initiate emerging models of governance, which co-exist with traditional ones.

Until the 1980s, most national economies were characterized by a clear hierarchy of norms both within the legal order and between public and private ordering. Transnational exchange was then governed by inter-governmental agreements aimed at articulating these national economic systems and associated public and private norms. Since then, this governance regime has experienced massive changes. A great number of new norm-makers and intermediaries now shape the incentives and sanctions that govern economic behaviors, resulting in complexity, unpredictability, inconsistencies, and innovations. The Handbook addresses this complexity, through expert analysis and case studies from a multidisciplinary team of economists, sociologists, political scientists, international political economy specialists and historians. The volume is organized around the logic of questioning how international systems of exchange work. In the first section, the authors explore the micro foundation of cross border exchange and transnational contracts by analyzing how private ordering, networks of agents, along with governments and officials build and regulate (imperfect) markets. The discussion then explores the challenges of compliance with those norms and regulations, highlighting how market discipline and judicial sanctions combine, and how a rule of law tends to develop at the international level. The next section studies the governmental initiatives to organize markets and fix market failures in a world characterized by political fragmentation and imbalance amongst governments, and also between states and non-governmental actors. Finally, there's consideration of new modes of law-making, new forms of adjudication and dispute settlement, new vectors of accountability and of guarantee of commitments that combine to initiate emerging models of governance, which co-exist with traditional ones.

This book offers a novel account of the significant debt crisis which hit many developing countries during the 1980s. It starts with the flawed cycle of bank lending during the 1970s, and then moves from the opening act, in Mexico in 1982, until a solution was found with the 1989 Brady Initiative.The Debt Crisis of the 1980s also articulates closely the economic and financial dimensions alongside the political and multilateral ones. The key relation between debtor countries and the IMF is explored in detail, but the book also documents the tense and often coercive interactions with commercial banks as well as on the continuing resistance to the IMF-led strategy among G7 governments. How debt contracts were restructured during all those years helps understanding how the Brady Initiative worked in practice, and how it prepared the ground for the turn to global markets after 1990. This debt crisis was indeed one of the main incubators of globalisation. This underlines further its unique character in the long-run history of sovereign debts, before and after the 1980s.Remarkably, this book rests on in-depth interviews with the key players. Transcripts are included for the six most important players, including the former heads of the US Federal Reserve and the IMF. Archives from the IMF, the New York Federal Reserve, the Bank of England and commercial banks have also been systematically exploited, often for the first time ever. This narrative and analytical account of one of the biggest debt crises in history is addressed to students and researchers in economics, international history, political economy and socio-legal studies. It will additionally be of value for professional economists and lawyers working on sovereign debts.