IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/p/ces/ceswps/_3770.html
   My bibliography  Save this paper

From Collapse to Constitution: The Case of Iceland

Author

Listed:
  • Thorvaldur Gylfason

Abstract

Most of the time, crises precede constitutions. Following a brief review of relevant historical background, this article aims to show why Iceland, after its financial collapse in 2008, is now at last on the road to adopting a new constitution to replace the provisional constitution from 1944. The aim is also to show how the constitutional bill of 2011 came into being with significant help from the general public. Further, the article outlines some of the key provisions of the bill as well as why and how it differs from the current constitution. The article concludes by offering a brief discussion of some potential obstacles to the adoption of the bill in parliament, the role of the public, and some lessons from, and for, other countries.

Suggested Citation

  • Thorvaldur Gylfason, 2012. "From Collapse to Constitution: The Case of Iceland," CESifo Working Paper Series 3770, CESifo.
    • Handle: RePEc:ces:ceswps:_3770
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: https://www.cesifo.org/DocDL/cesifo1_wp3770.pdf
    Download Restriction: no
    ---><---

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Carmen M. Reinhart & Kenneth S. Rogoff, 2009. "Varieties of Crises and Their Dates," Introductory Chapters, in: This Time Is Different: Eight Centuries of Financial Folly, Princeton University Press.
    2. Benedikt Goderis & Mila Versteeg, 2012. "Human Rights Violations after 9/11 and the Role of Constitutional Constraints," The Journal of Legal Studies, University of Chicago Press, vol. 41(1), pages 131-164.
    3. Daron Acemoglu & James A. Robinson & Ragnar Torvik, 2013. "Why Do Voters Dismantle Checks and Balances?," The Review of Economic Studies, Review of Economic Studies Ltd, vol. 80(3), pages 845-875.
    4. Davide Ticchi & Andrea Vindigni, 2010. "Endogenous Constitutions," Economic Journal, Royal Economic Society, vol. 120(543), pages 1-39, March.
    5. Komlos, John, 2003. "An anthropometric history of early-modern France," European Review of Economic History, Cambridge University Press, vol. 7(2), pages 159-189, August.
    6. Reinhart, Karmen & Rogoff, Kenneth, 2009. ""This time is different": panorama of eight centuries of financial crises," Ekonomicheskaya Politika / Economic Policy, Russian Presidential Academy of National Economy and Public Administration, vol. 1, pages 77-114, March.
    7. Torsten Persson & Guido Tabellini, 2005. "The Economic Effects of Constitutions," MIT Press Books, The MIT Press, edition 1, volume 1, number 0262661926, December.
    8. Ackerman, John, 2004. "Co-Governance for Accountability: Beyond "Exit" and "Voice"," World Development, Elsevier, vol. 32(3), pages 447-463, March.
    9. Carmen M. Reinhart & Kenneth S. Rogoff, 2014. "This Time is Different: A Panoramic View of Eight Centuries of Financial Crises," Annals of Economics and Finance, Society for AEF, vol. 15(2), pages 215-268, November.
    10. Brennan, Geoffrey & Buchanan, James M., 1977. "Towards a tax constitution for Leviathan," Journal of Public Economics, Elsevier, vol. 8(3), pages 255-273, December.
    11. World Bank, 2011. "World Development Indicators 2011," World Bank Publications - Books, The World Bank Group, number 2315, December.
    12. Andersen, Jørgen Juel & Aslaksen, Silje, 2008. "Constitutions and the resource curse," Journal of Development Economics, Elsevier, vol. 87(2), pages 227-246, October.
    13. Charles A.E. Goodhart, 2009. "The Regulatory Response to the Financial Crisis," Books, Edward Elgar Publishing, number 13514.
    14. Daron Acemoglu & James A. Robinson, 2000. "Why Did the West Extend the Franchise? Democracy, Inequality, and Growth in Historical Perspective," The Quarterly Journal of Economics, President and Fellows of Harvard College, vol. 115(4), pages 1167-1199.
    15. Daron Acemoglu & Georgy Egorov & Konstantin Sonin, 2012. "Dynamics and Stability of Constitutions, Coalitions, and Clubs," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 102(4), pages 1446-1476, June.
    16. Beard, Charles A., 1913. "An Economic Interpretation of the Constitution of the United States," History of Economic Thought Books, McMaster University Archive for the History of Economic Thought, edition 127, number beard1913.
    17. Brad M. Barber & Terrance Odean, 2001. "Boys will be Boys: Gender, Overconfidence, and Common Stock Investment," The Quarterly Journal of Economics, President and Fellows of Harvard College, vol. 116(1), pages 261-292.
    Full references (including those not matched with items on IDEAS)

    Citations

    Citations are extracted by the CitEc Project, subscribe to its RSS feed for this item.
    as


    Cited by:

    1. Thorvaldur Gylfason, 2012. "Constitutions: Financial Crisis Can Lead to Change," Challenge, Taylor & Francis Journals, vol. 55(5), pages 106-122.

    Most related items

    These are the items that most often cite the same works as this one and are cited by the same works as this one.
    1. Förster, Marcel & Jorra, Markus & Tillmann, Peter, 2014. "The dynamics of international capital flows: Results from a dynamic hierarchical factor model," Journal of International Money and Finance, Elsevier, vol. 48(PA), pages 101-124.
    2. Jean-Philippe Bouchaud & Damien Challet, 2016. "Why have asset price properties changed so little in 200 years," Papers 1605.00634, arXiv.org.
    3. Agnello, Luca & Castro, Vitor & Sousa, Ricardo M., 2013. "What determines the duration of a fiscal consolidation program?," Journal of International Money and Finance, Elsevier, vol. 37(C), pages 113-134.
    4. Erik Larson, 2017. "Demand for credit, international financial legitimacy, and vulnerability to crises: Regulatory change and the social origins of Iceland's collapse," Regulation & Governance, John Wiley & Sons, vol. 11(2), pages 185-202, June.
    5. Juan J. Cruces & Christoph Trebesch, 2013. "Sovereign Defaults: The Price of Haircuts," American Economic Journal: Macroeconomics, American Economic Association, vol. 5(3), pages 85-117, July.
    6. José García-Montalvo & Marta Reynal-Querol, 2019. "Gender and Credit Risk: A View From the Loan Officer’s Desk," Working Papers 1076, Barcelona School of Economics.
    7. Anna Shostya, 2019. "The Global Financial Crisis in Transition Economies: The Role of Initial Conditions," Atlantic Economic Journal, Springer;International Atlantic Economic Society, vol. 47(1), pages 37-51, March.
    8. Daniel Hansen, 2023. "The democratic (dis)advantage: The conditional impact of democracy on credit risk and sovereign default," Economics and Politics, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 35(1), pages 356-410, March.
    9. Oscar Bajo‐Rubio & Antonio G. Gómez‐Plana, 2022. "A multi‐country analysis of austerity policies in the European Union," The World Economy, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 45(1), pages 4-35, January.
    10. Anders Aslund, 2012. "Why a Breakup of the Euro Area Must Be Avoided: Lessons from Previous Breakups," Policy Briefs PB12-20, Peterson Institute for International Economics.
    11. José Garcia Montalvo & Marta Reynal-Querol, 2019. "Gender and credit risk: a view from the loan officer's desk," Economics Working Papers 1644, Department of Economics and Business, Universitat Pompeu Fabra.
    12. Carlos Felipe Balcázar, 2016. "Long-run effects of democracy on income inequality in Latin America," The Journal of Economic Inequality, Springer;Society for the Study of Economic Inequality, vol. 14(3), pages 289-307, September.
    13. José María Díez-Esteban & Jorge Bento Farinha & Conrado Diego García-Gómez & Cesario Mateus, 2022. "Does board composition and ownership structure affect banks’ systemic risk? European evidence," Journal of Banking Regulation, Palgrave Macmillan, vol. 23(2), pages 155-172, June.
    14. Karakas, Leyla D., 2016. "Political turnover and the accumulation of democratic capital," European Journal of Political Economy, Elsevier, vol. 44(C), pages 195-213.
    15. Fuertes, Ana-Maria & Phylaktis, Kate & Yan, Cheng, 2016. "Hot money in bank credit flows to emerging markets during the banking globalization era," Journal of International Money and Finance, Elsevier, vol. 60(C), pages 29-52.
    16. Reynal-Querol, Marta & García-Montalvo, José, 2020. "Gender And Credit Risk: A View From The Loan Officer'S Desk," CEPR Discussion Papers 14500, C.E.P.R. Discussion Papers.
    17. Ms. Thornton Matheson, 2011. "Taxing Financial Transactions: Issues and Evidence," IMF Working Papers 2011/054, International Monetary Fund.
    18. William Gatt, 2018. "Housing boom-bust cycles and asymmetric macroprudential policy," CBM Working Papers WP/02/2018, Central Bank of Malta.
    19. Claudio Oliveira De Moraes & Helder Ferreira de Mendonça, 2017. "The bridge between macro and micro banking regulation," Journal of Economic Studies, Emerald Group Publishing Limited, vol. 44(2), pages 214-225, May.
    20. Kunieda, Takuma & Shibata, Akihisa, 2012. "Asset bubbles, economic growth, and a self-fulfilling financial crisis: a dynamic general equilibrium model of infinitely lived heterogeneous agents," MPRA Paper 37309, University Library of Munich, Germany.

    More about this item

    JEL classification:

    • K10 - Law and Economics - - Basic Areas of Law - - - General (Constitutional Law)

    Statistics

    Access and download statistics

    Corrections

    All material on this site has been provided by the respective publishers and authors. You can help correct errors and omissions. When requesting a correction, please mention this item's handle: RePEc:ces:ceswps:_3770. See general information about how to correct material in RePEc.

    If you have authored this item and are not yet registered with RePEc, we encourage you to do it here. This allows to link your profile to this item. It also allows you to accept potential citations to this item that we are uncertain about.

    If CitEc recognized a bibliographic reference but did not link an item in RePEc to it, you can help with this form .

    If you know of missing items citing this one, you can help us creating those links by adding the relevant references in the same way as above, for each refering item. If you are a registered author of this item, you may also want to check the "citations" tab in your RePEc Author Service profile, as there may be some citations waiting for confirmation.

    For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its authors, title, abstract, bibliographic or download information, contact: Klaus Wohlrabe (email available below). General contact details of provider: https://edirc.repec.org/data/cesifde.html .

    Please note that corrections may take a couple of weeks to filter through the various RePEc services.

    IDEAS is a RePEc service. RePEc uses bibliographic data supplied by the respective publishers.