The European Central Bank

Résumé du document

After World War Two, the European countries decided to be closer in order to stop war and settle the peace in all of Europe. It was the beginning of what would become the European Union as we know it today.

Some important dates to remember:

• 1957: Treaty of Rome
• 1982: Treaty of Maastricht
• 1986: The single act
• 1997: Treaty of Amsterdam
• 2001: Treaty of Nice

At each stage The European Union has got larger, that is to say more and more countries have signed up and go deeper involved. The fact that The European Union gets larger means that the institutions of The European Union have multiplied and that the European authority is more and more present in the European countries.

The development of a lot of European institutions have created many debates. Indeed each time there is a new institution there is a transfer of competences from the states to the European power, so each European countries should be ready to lose a lot of power in favor of the development of the European Union.

The problem is that imposing the same rules on countries which are very different, to make them closer from an economic point of view, can create some friction between nations.

For these reasons we have decided to ask about the efficiency of the monetary measures:

From a monetary point of view, must we strive to make each country of The European Union a like?

In the first part we see the general principles of the European Monetary Union as imposed by the European Central Bank. After that we should study the aims of the European Union. And finally we should expose the problems that the European Union meets today.

Extraits

[...] The best return is looked . This activity is strictly separated from the others to not distort the market The risk management is very strict 4 - Promote the operation of payment systems: Nowadays, payment systems have become more and more importance in our daily life because of a rise of transactions in general both in volume and value. That's why the ECB takes care to build safe, functioning and smooth payment systems in order to get a minimal risk. [...]

[...] The ECB is at the centre of the European System of Central Bank (ESCB) and of the Euro System. Its main assignment is to stabilize the rate in the European economic area through the monetary policy. To achieve this assignment it changes the director rates. This work must limit the fluctuation of the Euro rate compared to the others currencies. The main purposes of the ECB are mentioned in statutes and in the treaty of the European Union. We have to remember that these texts talk about CBES rather than the Euro System because there are always countries in the EU which have not yet adopted the Euro. [...]

[...] Capul Ed : Hatier Analyse économique et historique des société contemporaines, sous la direction d'Alain Beitone Ed : Armand Colin Déchiffrer l'économie, Denis Clerc, seizième édition, collection Grands Repères Web sites: www. La-croix.com (map of the members of the euro zone) www.wikipedia.com http://www.ecb.int/ecb/html/index.fr.html http://www.lepoint.fr , actualités économiques du 08 octobre 2009 le taux directeur de la BCE stable a http://www.leparisien.fr, actualités économiques du 04 septembre 2009 Récession http://www.robert-shcuman.eu, La politique monétaire de la zone euro et la banque centrale européenne de Jean-François Jamet http://lesEchos.fr, archive du 04 juillet 2008, Politique monétaire : la BCE a-t-elle tout faux ? Newspapers: La tribune, 17/11/09 l'euro peut-il exploser ? [...]

[...] On the other hand, countries that have got into debts should make some arrangements (Belgium, Pays-Bas). Even though the creation of the European Central Bank reduces the autonomy of each States, especially in the “euro area” it also reduces the weight of the international market. It also means that more countries lose their national sovereignty; Europe is more powerful and able to compete against the other big economic powers. For example the European Union is responsible for 20% of the international exchange and the United States is responsible for 18% of it. [...]

[...] Now, we should see the steps which drove to the creation of the European Central Bank. In 1985 the European authority decided to create a committee to plan the development of the European Monetary Union. Jacques Delors was the director of this committee. This committee was also composed with the governors of national central banks such as Alexander Lamfalussy and Niels Thygesen for example. The result of the report of Jacques Delors was that the European Monetary Union should be achieved in three steps. [...]