Theoretical and empirical accounts of Swedish financial supervision in the twentieth century

Abstract: The thesis is concerned with the history of financial supervision in Sweden during the twentieth century up to the financial crisis in the early 1990s. To this end a theoretical framework is developed which is based on institutional economics, law and economics, theories on bureaucracies, regulatory enforcement and policy analysis. Except for the attempt to propose how financial supervision and supervisors could be understood theoretically, the thesis address problems ranging from the organization of supervision in relation to regulation and the changes of the regulated market, the constraints and abilities put on supervisors in different institutional arrangements and regulatory regimes, and the competence of supervisors. The extensive use of empirical data aims to make the thesis a contribution also to financial history research in general, and the growing research on the histories of financial supervision in particular.