Book contents
- Frontmatter
- Contents
- The G-24
- List of Contributors
- Foreword
- 1 Introduction
- 2 The Bretton Woods Institutions: Governance without Legitimacy?
- 3 Reforming the International Monetary Fund: Towards Enhanced Accountability and Legitimacy
- 4 Improving IMF Governance and Increasing the Influence of Developing Countries in IMF Decision-Making
- 5 Issues on IMF Governance and Representation: An Evaluation of Alternative Options
- 6 Making the IMF and the World Bank More Accountable
- 7 Purchasing Power Parities and Comparisons of GDP in IMF Quota Calculations
- 8 Measuring Vulnerability: Capital Flows Volatility in the Quota Formula
- 9 Enhancing the Voice of Developing Countries in The World Bank: Selective Double Majority Voting and a Pilot Phase Approach
- 10 Voting Power Implications of a Double Majority Voting Procedure in the IMF's Executive Board
- 11 Power versus Weight in IMF Governance: The Possible Beneficial Implications of a United European Bloc Vote
- 12 Changing IMF Quotas: The Role of the United States Congress
1 - Introduction
Published online by Cambridge University Press: 05 March 2012
- Frontmatter
- Contents
- The G-24
- List of Contributors
- Foreword
- 1 Introduction
- 2 The Bretton Woods Institutions: Governance without Legitimacy?
- 3 Reforming the International Monetary Fund: Towards Enhanced Accountability and Legitimacy
- 4 Improving IMF Governance and Increasing the Influence of Developing Countries in IMF Decision-Making
- 5 Issues on IMF Governance and Representation: An Evaluation of Alternative Options
- 6 Making the IMF and the World Bank More Accountable
- 7 Purchasing Power Parities and Comparisons of GDP in IMF Quota Calculations
- 8 Measuring Vulnerability: Capital Flows Volatility in the Quota Formula
- 9 Enhancing the Voice of Developing Countries in The World Bank: Selective Double Majority Voting and a Pilot Phase Approach
- 10 Voting Power Implications of a Double Majority Voting Procedure in the IMF's Executive Board
- 11 Power versus Weight in IMF Governance: The Possible Beneficial Implications of a United European Bloc Vote
- 12 Changing IMF Quotas: The Role of the United States Congress
Summary
The United Nations Monetary and Financial Conference held at Bretton Woods sixty years ago led to the establishment of the IMF and World Bank. This was a foundational moment. As the most powerful financial institutions of our times were created, hopes ran high of a better world, in which international cooperation through the IMF would sustain economic activity and prevent the adoption of measures destructive of national and international prosperity. The Bank was to assist reconstruction of war ravaged countries and finance the development of the less developed world. For a number of decades, the institutions created in Bretton Woods and the system based on them seemed to work well.
Today, the Bretton Woods Institutions (BWIs) play a diminished role and suffer from a loss of legitimacy and credibility. Several factors account for this diminished role. Among them the expansion of financial markets, the rapid growth of emerging market economies and the rigidity of a governance structure which reflects the political accommodation reached at the end of World War II; an outcome that has become increasingly obsolete and dysfunctional. The current governance structure of the IMF and World Bank fails to take into account the fact that today, the developing countries and economies in transition account for half of the world's output in real terms, for most of the world's population, encompass the most dynamic economies and hold about two-thirds of all international reserves.
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- Publisher: Anthem PressPrint publication year: 2005