Can the European Union, and in what way, for the purpose of prevailing the current crisis, use the more than two centuries old American experiences in developing fiscal federalism, in creating hard unique currency, in managing public debt and in stimulating capital inflow through direct investment and through capital markets? What institutional assumptions does this imply, what aspects of interdependence between fiscal and monetary policy need to be taken into account, and where to set solidarity boundaries among members in settling over-indebtedness, without triggering irresponsibility in future borrowing and spending?

Consideration of these and related issues marked the beginning of the International Economic Conference in Dubrovnik. The Croatian National Bank has been organizing the Conference for 19 consecutive years, and the participants are representatives of the most relevant international financial institutions, commercial and central banks, rating agencies and scientists from a number of distinguished world universities.

As the governor of the CNB Boris Vujčić mentioned in his introductory speech, first conferences dealt with the problems of transition and with creation of market economies in Central and Eastern European Countries, whereas in recent years the focus of discussions has been the current financial and economic crisis the duration of which has exceeded the initial expectations. Hence the program of the two-day conference that started today includes analyses and discussions that focus on finding a solution that might facilitate the ending of the crisis in the European Union, this being of crucial importance for Croatia as a new member of that international community.

The agenda of the conference includes debates on various topics such as: challenges that the emerging economies face as part of the development of capital markets, building of the European banking union, adjustments and diversities that the newly acquired member of the European Union needs to take into account, lessons that may be learned from the current crisis. Several other topics from the area of fiscal and monetary policy, as well as structural adjustments, shall also be discussed.