Since the publication of the English edition of my book in the autumn of 1930, sensational events have occurred in the world of affairs. The historic gold standard, which had been restored after the war at such heavy pains and costs, has been broken into fragments, and it is unlikely that it will ever be put together again in the old mould. When I wrote my book I was far from optimistic, but thought it right to pay due deference to the de facto arrangements of the world. I felt that the leading central banks would never voluntarily relinquish the then existing forms of the gold standard; and I did not desire a catastrophe sufficiently violent to shake them off involuntarily. The only practical hope lay, therefore, in a gradual evolution into the forms of a managed world currency, taking the existing gold standard as the starting point. It was on these considerations that I wrote (vol. 11, pp. 337–8) that, whilst before the de facto return to the gold standard I had advocated (in my Tract on Monetary Reform) other plans, nevertheless after the de facto return it was better to accept the fait accompli as our starting point ‘in spite of the disastrous inefficiency with which the international gold standard has worked since its restoration five years ago (fulfilling the worst fears and gloomiest prognostications of its opponents), and the economic losses, second only in amount to those of a great war, which it has brought upon the world’.