A Contemporary Analysis of Modern Central Banking

For the most part central banks have emerged as the champions among policy institutions post the financial and economic crisis of 2008, having steered the financial system away from near collapse via instantaneous changes in the interest rate, and providing liquidity support to the most bankrupt of financial institutions. But the crisis has in distinctive ways unsettled the seemingly compact and precise central bank framework and its concept of monetary policy.The standard mandate for a central bank that had acquired institutional independence was straight forward: maintain a certain level of inflation through the singular use of the short-term interest rate. Post the crisis there is less certainty on the focus on an inflation targeting framework as the crux of monetary policy.This body of work will review the inflation targeting framework in the face of the financial crisis of 2008 in how it had affected the central bank activity of The Federal Reserve Bank and the U.S economy as well as the South African Reserve Bank and the South African economy in which it resides.This academic engagement is key as we seek to dispute and confirm the status of central banking after the crisis.