It is up to economists to analyze whether and to what extent, in an international monetary system that has surely not yet become fully consistent in many of its parts, reference to gold, which performed a monetary function for thousands of years, can still contribute, in the decades ahead, to preserving that fundamental condition for orderly economic activity - price stability.
The experience of the period following the Second World War shows that macroeconomic stabilization has always provided the basis for the growth of the most successful economies. Conserving this stability and the soundness of economies’ fundamentals is one of the principal tasks of governments and central banks. BIS Review 110/2000  4