EH439 Half Unit
History of Banking Systems
This information is for the 2025/26 session.
Course Convenor
Dr Natacha Postel-Vinay
Availability
This course is available on the MSc in Financial History. This course is not available as an outside option to students on other programmes. This course uses controlled access as part of the course selection process.
How to apply: All Economic History courses are controlled access and capped. Priority will be given to students for whom the course is within their programme regulations.
All course choices submitted before the deadline will be considered. It is advisable that students submit a statement in support of their course choices as these will be used to allocate places where a course is oversubscribed.
Deadline for application: First round offers will be sent on Monday 29 September 2025. Students who submit their course choices after the deadline and students wishing to take an Economic History course as an outside option will be waitlisted initially and informed by Wednesday 1 October 2025 whether they have been successful.
Once an offer has been sent, you have 48 hours to accept it before it times out. Once an offer has timed out, it will be re-allocated to someone on the waitlist. In all cases, it is strongly advised that you have an alternative course choice as a back-up in case you are unable to secure your first choice.
For queries contact: If you have any questions, please contact the MSc Programmes Officer (o.harrison1@lse.ac.uk) A list of all taught master's courses in this Department are listed on LSE's course guide webpages. Guidance on how to apply to individual controlled access courses can also be found on LSE for You.
Course content
This course introduces students to problematics around the history of banking. It explores the rise of financial intermediaries over the centuries and how their role evolved from simple money changers to money creators via lending. Banks can sometimes fail; historical causes of these failures as well as macroeconomic consequences will be explored, going from the 19C through the Great Depression to the 21C. Countries have historically been aware of the central tension between the necessity to save a financial system from collapse and the imperative of no moral hazard created in the process. By looking at the evolution of crisis resolution and aspects of preventive regulation students will gain a deep understanding of the history of banking in the developed world.
Teaching
20 hours of seminars in the Winter Term.
Formative assessment
Students will be expected to produce 1 essay and 1 presentation in the WT.
Indicative reading
- Tooze, A. (2018). Crashed: How a Decade of Financial Crises Changed the World. London: Penguin Books.
- Aliber, R., & Kindleberger, Charles P. (2015). Manias, panics and crashes: A history of financial crises (Seventh ed.). Palgrave.
- Straumann, T. (2019). Debt, Crisis, and the Rise of Hitler. Oxford University Press.
- Galbraith, J. K. (2009) [1954]. The Great Crash 1929. Penguin.
- Bordo, M., Eichengreen, B., Klingebiel, D., & Martinez‐Peria, M. S. (2001). “Is the crisis problem growing more severe?”, Economic policy, 16(32), 52-82.
Assessment
Essay (100%, 4000 words) in Winter Term Week 10
Key facts
Department: Economic History
Course Study Period: Winter Term
Unit value: Half unit
FHEQ Level: Level 7
CEFR Level: Null
Total students 2024/25: 17
Average class size 2024/25: 17
Controlled access 2024/25: YesCourse selection videos
Some departments have produced short videos to introduce their courses. Please refer to the course selection videos index page for further information.
Personal development skills
- Leadership
- Self-management
- Team working
- Problem solving
- Application of information skills
- Communication
- Application of numeracy skills
- Commercial awareness
- Specialist skills