Joachim Nagel: Central bank independence - why it matters
Speech by Dr Joachim Nagel, President of the Deutsche Bundesbank, honouring Otmar Issing on his 90th birthday, Frankfurt am Main, 23 April 2026.
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1 Introduction
Ladies and gentlemen, Welcome to this colloquium in honour of Otmar Issing's 90th birthday!
Dear Otmar Issing, congratulationson this remarkable milestone. Today is a beautiful day to celebrate your birthday here in Frankfurt. We are delighted to welcome you back to the Bundesbank, the place where your journey as a central banker began. Even though we are not exactly in Wilhelm-Epstein-Strasse right now.
When you joined the Bundesbank in 1990, you came with a sharp mind and a firm belief: central banks should be independent. Not only did you advocate for this principle. You embedded it in the DNA of the Eurosystem.
As the ECB's first Chief Economist, you played a key role in designing a framework that balanced rules with flexibility, ensuring price stability without stifling growth. You took the Bundesbank's tradition of independence and made it Europe's.
But your legacy goes beyond policy. After your career as an active central banker, you continued to shape international discussions – through your writing, your teaching, and your leadership at the Center for Financial Studies. You never shied away from the hard questions – and you always demanded rigorous answers.
Over the last decade, you warned repeatedly against overburdening central banks with too many tasks and obligations. You saw the risk that this might ultimately erode their independence and weaken their ability to deliver on their mandate of price stability.
Today, we are seeing attacks on central bank independence around the world – from Jakarta to Istanbul, from Caracas to Washington. So, the topic of this colloquium in your honour could not be more fitting: Achieving and maintaining central bank independence – why it matters.
To ground our discussion, my speech will focus on a fundamental question: What evidence do we have that independence delivers on its promise to keep inflation low and stable? I will proceed in three steps: