Gender diversity as a tool to make central banks progressive institutions

Great Power, Great Responsibility: Addressing the Underestimated Issue of Central Bank’s Social Responsibility

“…Therefore, these objectives and concerns would be culturally built in the sense that they would embody a people's preferences: a key issue in a given country is not necessarily of utmost importance in another. For example, although the Bank of Israel has turned recently to the treatment of social inequalities among its official missions, the Bank of Ecuador has implemented policies aiming at supporting women under the governorship of Veronica Artola (Vallet, 2020).…”

“…Central banks are institutions in charge of the stability of the monetary and financial system for the benefit of every user of a currency, which includes price stability. Moreover, central banks are the monetary institutions transcending individuals and embodying a specific culture (Vallet, 2020). Central banks must thus be the bearers of such a specific culture.…”

“…Likewise, the increasing complexity and the uncertainty of the environment of central banks push for new types of recruitment to train new central banks. On the one hand, I suggest hiring people coming from other social sciences than mere economics: this would increase diversity among central banks' inner organization and would also foster creativity (Haldane, 2016;Vallet, 2020). Indeed, "economics (like all disciplines) ignores certain aspects of reality in order to focus on others.…”

“…Moreover, such an increased diversity would support the development of a new type of expertise, which seems crucial regarding the forthcoming challenges for central banks. To that aim, I coined the concept of "managerial expertise" to emphasize the need to promote new skills among the central bankers' community (Vallet, 2020). "Managerial expertise" would incentivize them to set new concerns on their agenda, placing the common good at the centre of their decisions.…”

“…Including such properties in the analysis is crucial for fulfilling (2), on the condition there is the adhesion of central banks' members to these properties. This enables a central bank to repro-duce itself over time as an institution, and to contribute to a culture and history that transcend the framework of the organization (Vallet, 2020).…”