Global Public Policy Institute
Reinhardtstraße 15
10117 Berlin
Germany
Phone +49 30 275 959 75-0
Fax +49 30 690 88 200
E-Mail gppi@gppi.net
18 May 2011
GPPi publishes op-ed on IMF leadership succession debate
On 17 May 2011, GPPi Associate Director Thorsten Benner published an op-ed in Germany’s Spiegel Online magazine titled Why the New IMF Chief Should Not Be a European. Benner argues that insisting on a European successor to Dominique Strauss-Kahn as head of the International Monetary Fund (IMF) violates a key promise made to rising powers and will thereby harm European credibility. Benner points out that in 2009, the G20 leaders agreed that the leadership of international financial institutions shall be selected in an open and merit-based process. Reappointing a European as the IMF director, which in German Chancellor Angela Merkel’s view is justified by the current challenge of the Euro crisis, would undermine European credibility, which has already suffered from Europe’s resistance to realigning IMF voting rights last fall. Arguing that only a European-led IMF will adequately deal with the European crisis, while consistently having ignored such ideas during financial turmoil in Latin America or Asia, would provide another excuse for rising powers to maintain their inactive role in global financial institutions under the pretext of marginalization by the established powers. Benner suggests that a genuinely merit-based process, which provides opportunities to highly qualified candidates from developing and emerging countries, and a common European stance in this process will ultimately yield a stronger Europe and a stronger IMF.
To read the article in English, please click here.
To read the article in German, please click here.
For more information please contact Thorsten Benner.