IMF
Last week, we asked our ONE members to write a message to the International Monetary Fund’s (IMF) new chief, Christine Lagarde, and tell her to keep her promises to the world’s poorest people.
Almost 100 ONE members from all over the world participated in this action, our second assignment from the ONE Act a Week series.
Here are some of our favorite messages from our members:
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Action 2. Time: 10 to 15 minutes. Level of difficulty: Moderately easy.
Thank you to everyone for participating in our first ONE Act A Week. Nearly 240 people from around the world sent messages of encouragement to the African Leadership Academy students featured in our “The Future of Africa” video. We’ll be sending your notes to those students soon. Here’s a few of my favorite messages that we received:
I’m a 49 year old American woman and I’ve been brought to tears by your optimism and your energy. I can’t wait to see Africa under your leadership!!!! -Brenda Nightingale
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Almost 48,000 ONE members signed our petition urging the International Monetary Fund (IMF) to run an open, transparent and merit-based process for their top position — but now the results are in. This week, the IMF’s executive board announced that they have chosen Christine Lagarde of France to succeed Dominique Strauss-Kahn as the managing director of the IMF.
As the IMF’s first female managing director, Ms. Lagarde will have one of the most powerful positions in global finance. She will be in charge of working with the IMF’s member nations to foster global monetary cooperation, secure financial stability and reduce poverty around the world, among other things. Her candidacy has won the support of several key African nations, including the Ivory Coast and the Democratic Republic of Congo.
Before coming to the IMF, Ms. Lagarde was the finance minister of France, one of Europe’s most powerful economies, and has been at the forefront of containing Europe’s debt crisis. This experience will serve her well, as she’ll be expected to guide the IMF through these tough economic times at the same level as her predecessor.
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Ever since the May 18th resignation of Dominique Strauss-Kahn as managing director of the International Monetary Fund (IMF), speculation has swirled over who will be chosen to replace him as the head of the IMF. You may have even signed our petition already. ONE and other organizations like Oxfam and ActionAid are campaigning for an open, merit-based process when this important choice is made. The IMF itself endorsed this process, agreeing in 2009 “that the heads and senior leadership of the international financial institutions should be appointed through an open, transparent, and merit-based selection process,” so this should be a no-brainer, right? The unwritten rule that the IMF’s managing director is European, while the president of the World Bank is American, puts the IMF at a disadvantage by disqualifying many qualified candidates.
It’s important that whoever is chosen to lead the IMF, they be qualified to face the challenges the IMF will tackle in the very near future — from the debate over how to deal with Greece’s economic crisis to completing a series of ongoing reforms meant to boost the voice of emerging countries in the IMF.
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By now, I’m sure you’ve received our email about our latest petition to the International Monetary Fund (IMF). We’re urging them to run a fair, transparent and merit-based process as they choose a new boss.
It seems like a no-brainer, but the vetting process for the world’s biggest financial institutions — the IMF and the World Bank — have been run as a sort of “gentleman’s agreement.” In complete layman’s terms, the US usually chooses the head of the World Bank, and Europe usually chooses the IMF’s leader. This process completely unfair, and as the Economist says, a “disgrace.” It simply closes out qualified candidates from all corners of the globe.
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This past weekend, the World Bank and International Monetary Fund (IMF) held their annual meetings in Washington, D.C., to discuss their work on a wide range of global economic issues including poverty reduction, economic development and international finance. Coming on the heels of the UN Summit and amid negotiations for replenishing the International Development Association (IDA), these meetings gave the Bank and the IMF a chance to discuss their reform efforts and work to recover countries from the financial crisis.
Here are three of the highlights:
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Some critics of the World Bank have focused on the disproportionate amount of voting power that the United States and Western European countries have compared to the rest of the world. India, China and Brazil in particular have argued that the voting procedures of the World Bank members do not accurately represent the world economy. Yesterday, the World Bank and International Monetary Fund (IMF) ended their annual spring meeting by announcing “historic” and unexpected changes. For the first time in its history, the World Bank took steps to redistribute voting power while at the same time asking for a capital increase.
The first change that came from the meetings was an agreement by member states to increase the World Bank’s lending resources by $86 billion. This is the first capital increase the bank has made in nearly 20 years, and it comes at a critical time. Because of it, the World Bank will be able to uphold its current agreements and continue lending money, in spite of the setbacks of the economic crisis.
The other significant change is the redistribution of voting power among member states, giving more power to developing countries. This redistribution increased the power of developing countries by three percent, to over 47% of the total power shared by member states. China’s influence in particular increased among member states as it was promoted to third among shareholders, behind the United States and Japan and ahead of Germany. India’s influence also increased to 7th, while Brazil, Russia, and Turkey were given more power as well. Many Western European countries who have traditionally dominated international finance, such as the UK, Canada, and France saw their influence decline due to the redistribution.
World Bank President Robert Zoellick endorsed the changes by saying that, “the shift in voting power is crucial for the Bank’s legitimacy. It recognizes that we need to consign outdated concepts like ‘Third World’ to the history books. He continued, “Today, the world is moving towards a fast new evolving, multipolar world economy.” These changes represent a turning point in the distribution of power within the World Bank. The promotion of developing countries and the reallocation of power from traditional leaders show that the World Bank and the International Monetary Fund are successfully changing their policies and structures in order to more accurately represent the evolving world economy.
