Thank you very much for inviting me.

The writings, judgments and speeches of many among this distinguished audience have shaped our understanding of the rule of law. I find it a privilege – and slightly daunting – to address you today on such a fundamental issue.

Today I am speaking to you as a central banker and banking supervisor. However, before I do so, allow me to take a moment to speak from a more personal perspective. Not as an official, but as the young law student I once was, reflecting on how I first came to understand and appreciate the rule of law.

As a law student at the University of Amsterdam in the early 1990s, I often cycled past a monument to Henk van Randwijk, a member of the anti-Nazi resistance during the Second World War. The monument is simple. A plain red brick…