Central bank independence, regulations, and monetary policy : from Germany and Greece to China and the United States /

This is a comprehensive, almost encyclopedic work about central banks in a number of countries. Ray Chaudhuri (Muhlenberg College) provides detailed accounts of the origins and evolution of central banking in the US, the UK, Russia, India, Japan, China, Brazil, and South Africa. The chapter on Germany and the European Central Bank is a particularly noteworthy treatment of the development in central banking over time in a changing context. The author does not stop short in the analyses, however, as the book includes current events such as India's demonetization. The final part of the work revisits the relationship between central bank independence and inflation, which brings the entire book together. Not everyone will enjoy the detail about such things as why the US has not redesigned the one-dollar bill (while other denominations have been changed) and the options for currency printing in Russia. But in this reviewer's view, Ray Chaudhuri manages this granularity without sounding pedantic. Meticulously researched and extremely well written, this is a must-have for any collection. Summing Up: Essential. Upper-division undergraduates through faculty. --Mary H. Lesser, Lenoir-Rhyne University