The first academic review of my book Banking in Crisis has been published in the Economic History Review. The review by Mark Billings (University of Exeter) says that my "contextualization of crises provides an excellent concise history of the last two hundred years of banking in Britain". Mark Billings finishes off his review by saying that "not all historians of British banking would agree with all Turner's arguments, but all will surely want to read this stimulating book and recommend it to their students. Regulators and policy makers should also read the book, not least to be shaken from any post-crisis complacency by Turner's gloomy conclusions on the direction of banking regulation".
My colleague and former PhD student Gareth Campbell has created a website about the British Railway Mania - click here . This episode has been described by the Economist as probably the greatest bubble in human history. Gareth's website provides background on the Mania and posits some explanations for the 'bubble'. In his explanation of why the bubble happened, Gareth places a lot of emphasis on investor myopia regarding future dividends and uncalled capital. His study of investors during the episode does not support the view that this episode was fuelled by naive and irrational investors.