The ECB - from a central bank of stability to a central bank of crisis?

Abstract

The seminar discusses the economic-constitutional architecture of the EMU and particularly the ECB. Questions are framed by a recently published book The ECB and the European Macroeconomic Constitution – From Ensuring Stability to Fighting Crises, that combines economics and constitutional law to gain understanding of the ECB’s current constitutional position.

The book claims that the EMU’s second decade turned out to be a decade of crises that has fundamentally altered its economic-constitutional framework. The price stability objective and the rules for fiscal policy that were to ensure economic stability and prosperity for the euro area Member States have been replaced by a series of ac hod decisions. In particular, the ECB that was assumed to facilitate broader economic stability through its constitutional focus on price stability, has arguably become the fire brigade of the euro area. In the process, the objective of price stability has been complemented by the objectives of financial stability, fiscal stability and even environmental and broader sustainability.

The seminar will discuss the book’s main claims and the implications the findings could have for euro area monetary policy, economic policy and for the EU legal order.

Programme

Welcome, Prof. Herwig Hofmann, Head of the Department of Law and Professor of European and Transnational Public Law at the University of Luxembourg

The ECB from a central bank of stability to a central bank of crises – how the ECB was drawn into multiple areas and what risks this entails, Dr. Klaus Tuori, University of Luxembourg, author of "The ECB and the European Macroeconomic Constitution – From Ensuring Stability to Fighting Crises" (Cambridge University Press, 2022)

The ECB’s changing role – lessons for the future, Yves Mersch, a former Member of the ECB’s Executive Board

The role of law and courts in guiding the ECB – more procedural than substantive control?, Judge Lars Bay Larsen, Vice-President of the Court of Justice of the European Union

Discussion

Registration

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