essay作业代写：布雷顿森林体系的复兴

essay作业代写：布雷顿森林体系的复兴
The Resurrection Of Bretton Woods System 

有人呼吁一个新的国际金融体系，以应付汇率波动系统和最近的金融危机。一些经济学家认为，大多数金融风暴是由不受限制的现金流造成的。固定利率的结构是用来阻止国家降低他们的货币的价值。然而，，一些国家发现，这是很难处理贸易赤字。对这些盈余国家来说，累计的外汇储备已在国内市场或国外投资。

Recently, on several occasions, French President Nicolas Sarkozy has proposed a new Bretton Woods. At the Dovas conference the resurrection of Bretton Woods system astonished journalists, albeit not the first time being spoken of by Mr Sarkozy. "The prosperity of the post-war era owed much to Bretton Woods ... we need a new Bretton Woods" he said.

Since the collapse of Bretton Woods in 1971 there are calls for a new international financial system to cope with the volatile exchange rate system and more recently the financial crises. Some economists are convinced that most of the financial turmoil was caused by unrestricted cash flows. The fixed rate structure was used to prevent the countries from reducing the values of their currencies. However, some countries found that it was difficult to deal with trade deficits. To those surplus countries, the accumulated foreign exchange reserves have been invested in domestic market or aboard. During the Bretton Woods period the reserves rose 55% from 1949 to 1969, but considerable amount of 2000% from 1969 to 2000. Such amount of money helped assets rocket up and bubble.

Back to the current financial crisis, in 2008, the UK Prime Minister Gordon Brown asked for a new international Bretton Woods system to prevent a similar crisis from occurring in the future.

"we must have a new Bretton Woods - building a new international financial architecture for the years ahead."

He expected to build a new international system to regulate the financial institutions and improve transparency by reforming the IMF into the "global central bank". Mr Sarkozy, also as the then president of EU, put forward the idea of Bretton Woods.

Later in the G20 meeting in Washington, 2008, world leaders discussed the financial crisis and the establishment of an international financial structure, however there was no substantial agreement about a new Bretton Woods.

In fact, after the collapse of the Bretton Woods in 1971, Asian countries, like China, Hong Kong, Japan, Singapore, South Korea re-established a system similar to that Bretton Woods. Through the pegged exchange rate to US dollar, these currencies were undervalued to stimulate exports particularly to the US market. Although there exist some problems in this regional Bretton Woods, the economy development of Asian countries are still admiring.

Another reason for introducing a new Bretton system might be the ambition of moving the global financial centre from US to another place most likely the EU. After World War II, as the strongest economic entity over the world, the US helped the recovery of the world economy and simultaneously promoted itself by being the centre country in the international monetary system. The meltdown of the US economy in the current crisis may be a great opportunity to snatch the global centre back from the US.

The obstacles and lessons from the past experience

However even with applause and support from financial experts and political leaders came hardly any substantial progress in achieving an international agreement of new Bretton Woods system.

There are noticeable obstacles to introducing such a new system. Because of the high-speed development of the global economy in the last half century and more and more tortuous political events, it is impossible to reach a consensus in the next few months, even years. First let us compare the circumstances between the previous Bretton Woods and now.

The Bretton Woods agreement in 1944 was a real exception after recalling a great deal of failures of other proposals in modern history. Thanks to the Great Depression and especially, the United States was the only country holding the necessary resources to remake the world. Although the current financial crisis was disastrous, it is not comparable with Great Depression.

In addition, the then host country of US is culprit rather than saviour in the current crisis, which means that a new host is needed in curbing the chaos with the help of tremendous financial resources to back the system.

The success of the original Bretton Woods to some extent depended on the work and cooperation between Harry Dexter White and John Maynard Keynes in the US and UK treasuries respectively. It took them about three years to prepare the system which is apprehensive at present. Approximately two years has passed without a draft being proposed since the renewal of this issue in 2008. So how long it would take cannot be predicted.

Moreover the Euro zone has undergone a disaster caused by the Greek debt crisis. Europe union, especially France and Germany, are struggling to end it and re-stabilize the Euro zone. This crisis on the European doorstep whatever distracts them from the new Bretton Woods.

The previous Bretton Woods was basically achieved when 45 allies got involved in the discussion and decision making. Despite new Bretton Woods being mainly related to global financial structure, under no circumstances should those developing countries be fenced off from the conference. Most of the developing countries, also as Non-OECD members, have not been in a mess by the financial crisis due to the exclusion of mortgage markets. Nevertheless, these export-driven countries are being smashed down by the declining demand of exports in industrialized countries. As a result, this new meeting of the Bretton Woods ought to be more inclusive than the previous one and a discussion of new financial system alone is implausible.

Even if a new Bretton Woods is established, how to get around the tragic fate of the previous one deserves proper consideration. The Bretton Woods ended up floating the exchange rate because of a serious weakness, i.e. the IMF could not compel the surplus countries to change exchange rates upwards. Particularly, the base currency country the US could not devalue its currency even though it was overvalued. Thus it is crucial to choose a base currency for the new Bretton Woods system. According to the present global financial market the Euro, US Dollar or Chinese Yuan may be the alternatives. Because of the special government-driven market economy of China and its backward economic base comparing with Europe and US the chance Chinese Yuan being the base currency is slim. In March 2009, the governor of the People's Bank of China (i.e. China central bank) argued that any national currency is unsuitable to be base currency and suggested the use of IMF Special Drawing Rights as base currency. The idea that the base currency rotates between Euro and Dollar each couple of decades may be another compromise.

The exchange rate defined in the fixed rate system is another key issue. As mentioned above, the developing countries must be involved in the new Bretton Woods, like China, India, and Latin America etc. Unfortunately, to solve the problems between China and the US will be a time-consuming and complex process. Nowadays the analysis of economic problems should be included with the political clashes, particularly in the events China is involved in. Since the failure of reaching the agreement of climate change in Copenhagen, then US arms sales to Taiwan, and China-US trade and RMB exchange rate issue, the nervous tension between these two countries has plagued not only their own economies but globally. In order to keep the high-speed development, Chinese government is insisting on keeping RMB undervalued. A few days ago, President Obama required China to adopt a "market-oriented exchange-rate policy" and 130 members of US House of Representatives tagged China as "currency manipulator", while Chinese Premier Wen refuted that RMB is not undervalued. Thus, if the fixed rate in the new Bretton Woods system contradicts Chinese intention, the compromise from China is highly impossible.

The next hurdle to be overcome is the definition of new Bretton Woods. Mr Sarkozy cynically proposed a new Bretton Woods with fixed exchange rate such that "We will not allow monetary dumping". However, the new Bretton Woods from PM Brown is different with that of Mr Sarkozy. The new system Mr Brown wanted is to improve transparency, integrity and responsibility. It "captures the full benefit of global markets and capital flows, minimises the risk of disruption and maximises opportunities for all, lifting up the most vulnerable in different parts of the world" He said "The founders of Bretton Woods had devised in the 1940s rules for a world of limited capital flows and we must now devise rules for a world of global capital flows the institutions and initiatives of the post-war era had been shaped only to the conditions of their time, a world economy of protected national markets, limited capital flows and fixed exchange rates". That Mr Brown's view of a new financial structure to prevent the financial crisis rather than a fixed rate Bretton Woods is obviously contrary to the essence of previous and Mr Sarkozy's new Bretton Woods.

As time passes, it does not only prolong the agenda of new Bretton Woods discussion but also the other global issues, like climate change. The fruitless Copenhagen climate conference was more of a symbolism showing too much hassle to collaborate in current global environment than a failure of reaching a specific agreement. Both new Bretton Woods and climate change issue are too elaborate to be dealt with in a single meeting. The progress of one issue means the delay of the other.

When national leaders try to resurrect a new fixed rate system though the lesson from current financial crisis, some economists argue that floating rate currency is not the root of all evil but the greed of human beings and lack of regulation are. Renewing a system adopting fixed rate cannot crack all the problems, and domestic problems in US, even UK require specific actions by home leadership. Furthermore, as the financial crisis began to recede, countries are losing the willingness and momentum to tackle financial crisis.

Conclusion:结论

The proposal of new Bretton Woods by so many national leaders, governors and economists at different occasions is apparently not on impulse. We should learn the lessons of the financial crises in the last two to three decades and gather to avert it happening again. Without a wide foresight over the world, such a new system will not be established under the shadow of those obstacles.