Private capital flows are playing a growing and crucial role in industrial as well as developing countries. They may promote economic development or suddenly disrupt economic order and create serious crises.

Mexico's currency crisis of December 1994 is a recent example. Discussing both the origins of and the remedies for Mexico-style crises, this book provides profound insights into a problem which is of concern to policymakers and the public at large in many countries of the world.

The book reports on in-depth discussion of both short-term and long-term proposals discussed by a group of highly experienced researchers and central bankers.It includes papers by Ariel Buira, Peter Kenen, Stephany Griffith-Jones, and a joint paper by Barry Eichengreen and Charles Wyplosz.

Buira reviews the main hypotheses that have been advanced to explain the Mexican crisis. Kenen addresses the more general issue of how the disruption to national economies that results from fluctuations in cross-border flows can be minimised. Griffith-Jones considers the new features of recent and possible future currency crises. Wyplosz and Eichengreen draw out some lessons from exchange rate crises that have occurred over the last thirty years in a large number of industrial countries.