Financial crises, non-economic factors, and governmental responses: The Mexican and Malaysian cases in the 1990s.

摘要

Financial crises are significant economic, political and international events. In today's financial affairs, the world cannot ignore financial crises occurring in a particular country or region due to their multiple economic, financial and political implications at domestic, regional, and international levels. Nor can those countries or regions dealing with their own crises ignore their network of linkages with the outside world. Despite the broad literature on financial crises, the causes and consequences of financial crises and governmental policy responses have not been sufficiently explained.; This dissertation is mainly concerned with two major questions: (1) how does a financial crisis develop and (2) how does a government respond to a financial crisis? In an attempt to shed light on these questions, it closely examines two cases: Mexico during the Mexican peso crisis of 1994–1995, and Malaysia during the Asian financial crisis of 1997–1998. It argues that economic explanations of financial crises are lacking in answering these questions, since they do not pay enough attention to non-economic factors stemming from a county's political, societal, institutional and external contexts.; The examination of the Mexican and Malaysian cases evidence this argument and shows that multiple non-economic factors—domestic political, societal, institutional, and psychological/ideological factors as well as external influences and pressures—can play as significant roles as economic ones. An interplay of these non-economic factors with economic ones brought these financial crises and shaped the Mexican and the Malaysian governments' policy behaviors.; In order to explain the impact of various non-economic factors as well as their interplay with economic variables in bringing financial crises and in shaping governmental policy responses, the dissertation offers an explanatory framework. It discusses the nature of the causal mechanism that leads to financial crises and shapes governmental responses. It also compares the cases to a certain extent, and assesses the variations across the cases in terms of the relative impact of economic versus non-economic factors and domestic versus external factors. Thus, the dissertation bridges economic explanations of financial crises with political economy, political science/comparative politics, and international relations literatures, which are helpful in explicating the impact of non-economic factors on markets and governmental policy behaviors. For its purposes, it uses a comparative methodology and case study approach that requires an in-depth analysis of each case.