Banking in western Europe

The aim of this book is to provide an account of the banking institutions of Western Europe, an account that will serve both as a source for students of comparative institutions and monetary policy and as a reference work for bankers and others who have not the leisure for research into the banking literature of individual countries. In general, it covers ordinary commercial banks, other financial businesses providing services substantially of a banking kind, central banks, and any other important official institutions granting credits and concerned in the implementation of monetary policy.
The contributors have academic rather than practical banking backgrounds, but they were selected partly for the closeness of their contacts with practical bankers over a long period. They share the common background of international thought on monetary problems, but there has been no regimentation in this respect, and minor diversities of view will be apparent at some points. To secure some uniformity of scope, they were asked the same questions, but they were allowed considerable latitude in their detailed methods of treating these questions. In general they were not shown each others' preliminary drafts, and the comparative element in the various chapters derives chiefly from the fact that the contributors all started with considerable knowledge of other systems besides those on which they were writing.