India was one of the better performers after the global financial crisis, and has done well despite opening out in a period of great international volatility. This book asks if this was due to luck or to good management. How much did macroeconomic policy contribute and did it do as much as it could have, on a reform path that was not standard? Are there any lessons from the Indian experience for the rest of the world? Senior Indian policy economists, market participants, and researchers address these interesting and important questions. There are those who think financial reform has gone too fast - relaxations in foreign borrowing norms exposed firms to external shocks. Volatile capital flows impacted markets, although more liberalization of risk-sharing equity compared to debt flows, was effective in reducing domestic risk. But there are also those who think reform was too slow - choking financial development: many markets and instruments that could improve domestic financial intermediation and reduce risk were held back. Analysis suggests policy was able to find the correct timing, pace and combination of reforms and of caution, but improvement is always possible. Luck and inherent strengths of the economy helped absorb both policy mistakes and external shocks. This book was originally published as a special issue of Macroeconomics and Finance in Emerging Market Economies.

India was one of the better performers after the global financial crisis, and has done well despite opening out in a period of great international volatility. This book asks if this was due to luck or to good management. How much did macroeconomic policy contribute and did it do as much as it could have, on a reform path that was not standard? Are there any lessons from the Indian experience for the rest of the world? Senior Indian policy economists, market participants, and researchers address these interesting and important questions.

There are those who think financial reform has gone too fast - relaxations in foreign borrowing norms exposed firms to external shocks. Volatile capital flows impacted markets, although more liberalization of risk-sharing equity compared to debt flows, was effective in reducing domestic risk. But there are also those who think reform was too slow - choking financial development: many markets and instruments that could improve domestic financial intermediation and reduce risk were held back. Analysis suggests policy was able to find the correct timing, pace and combination of reforms and of caution, but improvement is always possible. Luck and inherent strengths of the economy helped absorb both policy mistakes and external shocks.

This book was originally published as a special issue of Macroeconomics and Finance in Emerging Market Economies.

The book discusses Indian post-independence monetary history in the context of the country s development and the global changes of the period. The conceptual framework used is the SIIO (Structure, Ideas, Institutions and Outcomes) paradigm. That is, structure and ideas become embedded in institutions and affect outcomes. Narrative history, data analysis and research reports demonstrate the dialectic between ideas and structure with respect to monetary history, aspects of India s development, and the global institutions and events that impacted monetary choices. The history of the economy and of the global changes that affected it covers a time when major changes took place both in India and internationally.

India s greater openness is important both for it and for the world, but it occurred at a time of major global crises. How did these impact monetary choices and how did the latter help India navigate the crises while maintaining its trajectory towards greater liberalization? The book explores these and other relevant but under-analyzed questions.

The initial combination of ideas and structure created fiscal dominance and made monetary policy procyclical. An aggregate supply-and-demand framework derived from forward-looking optimization subject to Indian structural constraints is able to explain growth and inflation outcomes in the light of policy actions. Using exogenous supply shocks to identify policy shocks and to isolate their effects, demonstrate that policy was sometimes exceedingly strict despite the common perception of a large monetary overhang. Surges and sudden stops in capital flow also constrained policy.

But the three factors that cause a loss of monetary autonomy governments, markets and openness moderate each other. Markets moderate fiscal profligacy and global crises moderate market freedoms and ensure openness remains a sequenced and gradual process. The book argues greater current congruence between ideas and structure is improving institutions and contributing to India s potential."

The book presents and further develops basic principles and concepts in international finance and open economy macroeconomics to make them more relevant for emerging and developing economies (EDEs). The volume emphasises the necessity of greater knowledge of context as populous Asian economies integrate with world markets, as well as the rapidly changing nature of the area due to rethinking after the global financial crisis. It addresses a host of themes, including key issues such as exchange rate economics, macroeconomic policy in an open economy, analytical frameworks for and experience of EDEs after liberalisation, the international financial system, currency and financial crises, continuing risks and regulatory response. This book will be useful to scholars and researchers of economics, especially in macroeconomics, business and finance and development studies.

After liberalization in the 1990s, growth rates were higher but were more volatile. The countries that did manage to sustain a high rate of growth followed a pragmatic reform path, which was neither a pure market nor a government-led approach. However, such pragmatic reform requires a deep knowledge of the economy derived from careful fact-based research. This volume contributes to the required knowledge on a range of issues such as drivers of growth, domestic reforms compared to external reforms, macroeconomic policy coordination, macroeconomic policy institutions and practices, the effect of openness and of global economic integration, poverty and the degree of inclusion, bottlenecks in infrastructure, and the performance of major sectors such as agriculture, industry and finance. The essays provide a finer understanding of the interaction between domestic strengths, external opportunities and government interventions.