Reinventing the World Bank

In May Northwestern University, Chicago, and SOAS, London, organised a meeting to examine the World Bank’s mission, operations and research output. The participants ranged from senior US Government officials, to researchers, World Bank staff, and campaigners from North and South. Whilst no consensus was reached on what needs to be done, some very interesting papers were presented. These include:

• The US agenda for the Bank, Timothy Geithner, US Under-Secretary for International Affairs;
• The Bank’s role in Sub-Saharan Africa, Prof. John Sender, SOAS;
• Financial accountability for the IBRD, Prof. Kunibert Raffer, Vienna University;
• From loan approval to development effectiveness?, Bruce Rich, Environmental Defense Fund;
• The anatomy of World Bank governance, Devesh Kapur, Harvard;
• Criminal debt, Prof. Jeff Winters, NWU;
• The gap between Bank policy advice and reality, Rizal Ramli, Indonesia.

Most of the above papers are available on www.worldbank.nwu.edu. An edited volume will appear next year from Cornell University Press.

A report of the meeting is available from the Bretton Woods Project.