Geoffrey Ingham, in an influential sociological work, described the links between the City, the Bank of England and the Treasury as the ‘core institutional nexus’ of British society. The idea of a ‘City–Bank–Treasury nexus’ has been taken up by Peter Cain and Anthony Hopkins, whose concept of ‘gentlemanly capitalism’ rests on a belief that metropolitan finance dominated British politics, to the detriment of the interests of the manufacturing industry. In particular, they argue that economic policy was shaped by a belief that integration with the international economy was a national, as well as a City, interest. The belief that industry has suffered from the City's superior access to policy-making through the Treasury has been shared by other economic historians, with the Treasury's support for free trade and the gold standard before and after the First World War being cited as prime examples. Similarly, moves towards convertibility of sterling in the 1950s have been seen as the product of an overriding concern with the international interests of the City. On the other hand, attempts to use archival material to study how the City could influence the Treasury have been rare. Robert Boyce and Ewen Green have documented a shared ideology about Britain's role in the international economy and have shown how the City could act as an organised lobby. Still less attention has been paid to the question of how the Treasury could influence the City.