The first recorded instance of a government debt default occurred in Greece. In the fourth century BC, 10 members of the Attic Maritime Association defaulted on loans from the Delos temple. These city-states have had many followers. Six European countries defaulted on external debt between 1300 and 1800 – some of them several times – according to Credit Suisse. Since then, it is hard to keep count. Yet the predominant thinking in policy circles now is that sovereign default in an advanced economy, as an International Monetary Fund report puts it, is “unnecessary, undesirable and unlikely”.
历史上有记录的第一个政府债务违约的事例就出现在希腊。公元前4世纪，阿提卡海洋联盟(Attic Maritime Association)的10个城邦未能偿还提洛神庙(Delos temple)的借款。这些城邦拥有众多的追随者。根据瑞信(Credit Suisse)的资料，从1300年到1800年，共有6个欧洲国家拖欠过外债（其中一些国家不止一次）。自那以后，就很难进行确切的统计了。然而，正如国际货币基金组织(IMF)一份报告所指出的那样，目前政策圈子中的主导思想是，发达manbetx20客户端下载 体的主权违约是“不必要、不受欢迎和不太可能的”。