Reinventing monies in Europe

Abstract

This paper offers much-needed analytical refinement to the sociology of money. I argue that we need to develop a conceptual vocabulary that enables us to take account of two apparently conflicting trends in the world's money flows. While state-issued 'currency' is undergoing a process of homogenization, 'money' in a generic sense is diversifying through the rapid growth of new monetary forms. I move on to suggest that all forms of money (some currencies, others not) should be regarded as dual: as monies of account and as monetary media. This dualism sheds new light on a monetary form that sociologists have either ignored or misunderstood, namely the euro. It enables us to conceive of the euro as a highly unorthodox, or hybrid, currency. Moreover, it suggests that, by virtue of this unorthodoxy, the euro zone represents a special case of currency homogenization that may actually stimulate monetary diversification. Copyright © 2005 Taylor & Francis.