See, for example, George Benston (1989), The Separation of Commercial from Investment banking: The Glass-Steagall Act Revisited and Reconsidered, Kluwer Academic Press, Randall S. Kroszner and Raghuram G. Rajan (1994), “Is the Glass-Steagall Act Justified? A Study of the U.S. Experience with Universal Banking before 1933”, American Economic Review, Vol. 84, pp. 810–32, Eugene N. White (1986), “Before the Glass-Steagall Act: An Analysis of the Investment Banking Activities of National Banks”, Explorations in Economic History, Vol. 23, pp. 33–55, and Charles W. Calomiris (2003), U.S. Bank Deregulation in Historical Perspective, Cambridge University Press. Marc Flandreau (2011), “New Deal Financial Acts and the Business of Foreign Debt Underwriting: Autopsy of a Regime Change” shows how the Glass-Steagall Act and other New Deal legislation conferred greater power on policymakers at the expense of international bankers and discusses some consequences for financial markets. Flandreau’s article can be downloaded from Norges Bank’s website: http://www.norges-bank.no/Upload/82434/EN/FLANDREU%20 Paper.pdf. In this area, there are few, if any, ultimate truths, and the pendulum appears to be swinging back again. In the US, the UK and the euro area, reintroducing some sort of separation between retail and investment banking is now being discussed (cf. the Volker Rule (US), the Vickers Commission (UK) and the Liikanen Plan (EU). Andrew Haldane at the Bank of England has recently discussed this issue in his speech, “On being the right size”, where he also outlines proposals for future banking sector regulation (see http://www.bankofengland. co.uk/publications/Pages/speeches/2012/615.aspx).

Headed by Professor Trond Helge Torsvik, this group worked to incorporate the theory of plate tectonics into a broader theory of mantle dynamics as an explanatory model for movements in the Earth’s crust. The aim is to understand the development of the Earth over several hundred million years. This is truly an ambitious example of learning from history. The Centre for Earth Evolution and Dynamics at the University of Oslo was just awarded the status of Centre of Excellence in research. 3  Descriptions of the causes of the financial crisis that began in1929 bear a striking resemblance to today’s headlines: a massive and unregulated shadow banking system, global imbalances and substantial income inequality (see John Kenneth Galbraith (1997): The Great Crash, 1929, Houghton Mifflin). 4  “More than anyone else”, Einar Lie writes, “he adhered to the fiscal policy convictions that he brought along to the postwar Ministry of Finance, which bore the stamp of his experience from a time without sufficiently stringent regulation of government finances”. Lie, E. and C. Venneslan (2010) Over evne. Finansdepartementet 1965–1992 [Beyond our power], Pax forlag  2  BIS central bankers’ speeches  markets were self-correcting. Following the Depression, a new truth emerged, with John Maynard Keynes and Norway’s own Ragnar Frisch at the forefront: prices and wages do not adjust that quickly – nor can we expect that markets will automatically ensure full employment. Hence, government should play a more active role in economic policy. At the Ministry of Finance, Nissen kept to the traditional view.