Governing EU banks after the global financial crisis : from regulation to governance

Abstract

This chapter will argue that one lasting legacy of the Global Financial Crisis has been the shift to bank governance as a key regulatory technique for influencing bank behaviour in the EU. Such governance mechanism is established by the ensemble of rules and prerogatives of supervisory and resolution authorities, which allows them to intervene and guide the behaviour of cross-border banks, also in areas traditionally conceived of in terms of autonomy of the business enterprise (Grundmann 2015; Smoleńska 2021). Such limitation is complemented with greater responsibilities for banks for public goals and objectives, both in terms of the regulatory processes and internal management (risk-management) requirements as well as observed bank conduct.