244 Hegemonic Stability Theories of the International Monetary System
maintenance of international monetary stability. Moreover, it was precisely
when important economic power most forcefully conditioned the form of the
international system that the potential for instability, in a dynamic sense, was
greatest. Above all, historical experience demonstrates the speed and
pervasiveness of changes in national economic power; since hegemony is
transitory, so must be any international monetary system that takes hegemony
as its basis. Given the costs of international monetary reform, it would seem
unwise to predicate a new system on such a transient basis.