Thirdly, of course, there were crises in several fixed rate countries (Mexico and Brazil), and they adopted flexible exchange rates as a result. It is this more widespread adoption of exchange rate regimes at the floating end of the spectrum which I would like to call “flexible” rather than “floating” (more on this later) - that brought inflation targeting to centre-stage.
Once a fixed exchange rate is abandoned as the nominal anchor of monetary policy, the question is what should be put in its place. Going back several decades, the answer might have been to adopt some form of monetary target.