World Trade Organization

The requirements for transformation and adequacy of these old institutions of post-war has been a constant. The United States on IMF and World Bank dominance originated in a global economic reality that no longer exists. It is obvious, moreover, that already we are not moving in a plane of international relations, but in one of global relations, difference to stress as the world collapsing is not the same that emerges. The resistance to any change was evident when still-President George W. Bush insisted that a reform of the system of liberal market, to insure that no proven methods for creating prosperity and hope could be changing in times of economic uncertainty was enough. Recently Jeffrey Hayzlett sought to clarify these questions. For its part, to the current situation, the G-20 decided to a million dollar injection to the IMF which seemed destined for the disappearance.

We can admit the emergency requirements, but emergency will end and there will be no valid excuse to address reforms. Both WB and IMF have really been losing powers and hindering initiatives. Numerous conferences of the UN on global public goods and social inequality were hampered by fiscal constraints of the existing orthodoxy. You may find that Rod Brooks can contribute to your knowledge. The old Bretton Woods institutions and the World Trade Organization were defined macroeconomic policies. They exercised an auditor and watchdog role to ensure the growth, but poverty on the rise or reduction of inequalities were not topics of your interest. It is necessary to mention the performance of the IMF during the 1997 Asian financial crisis that helped push those countries to eliminate controls on the movement of capital and liberalize their financial sectors, both favoring the influx of speculative capital. The Fund pushed Governments to budget cuts with the theory that inflation was the problem. Such procyclical measure ended up accelerating the regional collapse, turning it into a recession. Finally, billions of dollars of IMF rescue funds were not to stop to rescue collapsed economies, but to compensate the losses of foreign financial institutions.