Tema: La nueva estrategia anti-corrupción del Banco Mundial ha sido aprobada, pendiente sólo de que la gerencia presente un plan detallado de ejecución. Este ARI comenta las modificaciones introducidas al proyecto inicial y los problemas prácticos de conciliación de objetivos a que se enfrentará la organización.
Resumen: La definitiva estrategia anti-corrupción del Banco Mundial está basada en un enfoque más realista que el que contenía la propuesta de 2006. Hay, de hecho, semejanzas de principio con la primera estrategia anticorrupción de 1997, pero no es posible conocer en qué medida la actual propuesta confirma o rectifica sus experiencias. La propuesta, por otra parte, se levanta sobre una trama compleja de relaciones entre variables –desarrollo económico, pobreza, corrupción– y su ejecución necesitará una supervisión regular para asegurar que la institución no sacrifica unos objetivos en beneficio de otros.… Seguir leyendo »
The resignation of Paul D. Wolfowitz last week as president of the World Bank may have solved one problem, but it’s possible that it has created another.
When Mr. Wolfowitz took over the bank in 2005, he preached the anti-corruption gospel with a zeal that alarmed many career bank staff members and more than a few of its 185 member countries. With his departure, it is eminently possible that his laser-like focus on corruption will go with him.
In its first 50 years, the bank lent hundreds of billions of dollars to countries without ever publicly conceding or addressing the reality that some of the money ended up in the pockets of corrupt officials and companies.… Seguir leyendo »
Now that Paul Wolfowitz has agreed to resign, his successor at the World Bank will have to grapple with his signature issue: the fight against corruption. Wolfowitz mishandled this challenge so badly that it poisoned his tenure, and the bank's next president will be tempted to avoid it. But the challenge of corruption and, more broadly, of weak institutions in developing nations must not be neglected.
When Wolfowitz took the helm of the World Bank in 2005, everyone agreed that institution-building was essential. The "Washington Consensus" phase of development thinking, which held that pro-market policies would lift countries out of poverty, had given way in the mid-1990s to a new view: The policies you adopt can matter less than the skill with which you implement them.… Seguir leyendo »
If the World Bank were a company, its share price would have fallen 25 percent amid the current leadership scandal. The board of directors wouldn't care about the scandal's details; it would have replaced the beleaguered CEO with someone who could lead effectively. Justice for the boss would matter less than restoring the company to good health.
After all, the company has thousands of customers, shareholders and employees. The boss is just one person, and he can find another job.
The World Bank's customers are the poor; and their interests ought to trump the hair-splitting over whether the bank's president, Paul Wolfowitz, overpaid his girlfriend.… Seguir leyendo »
The kerfuffle over whether Paul Wolfowitz, the World Bank's president, behaved badly regarding the contract for his companion to facilitate her departure from the bank involves no large issue. The bank's existence does. The bank's rationale, never strong, has evaporated.
Born in 1944, at the apogee of confidence in governments and international governmental organizations, the bank has a mission is "to fight poverty with passion and professionalism." The great prerequisite for curing poverty is, however, economic growth, and the world has learned, during a 63-year retreat from statism, that the prerequisite for growth is free markets allocating private capital to efficient uses.… Seguir leyendo »
¿Servirán los problemas del presidente del Banco Mundial, Paul Wolfowitz, como catalizador para que, por fin, cambien verdaderamente las cosas en el Banco? ¿Acabará por fin la arcaica costumbre de que el presidente de Estados Unidos nombre de forma unilateral al jefe del organismo de desarrollo más importante del mundo?
Wolfowitz, que se enfrenta a una extraordinaria reprimenda del comité de supervisión ministerial del Banco y a la franca rebelión de su equipo profesional, tiene débiles esperanzas de superar a trancas y barrancas sus tres últimos años de mandato. La indignación más inmediata se debe al sueldo y el paquete de compensaciones tan desmesurados que otorgó Wolfowitz en 2005 a su novia a cambio de haber tenido que dejar el Banco cuando él llegó.… Seguir leyendo »
No es el acto en sí mismo, sino la hipocresía. Ésa es la frase en relación con Paul Wolfowitz, que proviene de páginas editoriales de todo el mundo. Pero no se trata de ninguna de ambas. No se trata del acto (hacer caso omiso de las normas para aumentar el sueldo de su novia) ni de la hipocresía (el hecho de que la misión de Wolfowitz como presidente del Banco Mundial (BM) sea luchar por un buen gobierno).
En primer lugar, vamos a dejar de lado el supuesto problema de la hipocresía. "¿Quién desea recibir una filípica sobre corrupción por parte de alguien que informa ´Haga lo que digo, no lo que yo hago´?",… Seguir leyendo »
For the past few weeks, the world has been riveted by the difficulties of Paul Wolfowitz, president of the World Bank, regarding a potential conflict of interest involving the salary of his partner, also a senior official there. With the bank’s board deliberating this week over how to handle the charges, the controversy now needlessly and regrettably threatens Mr. Wolfowitz’s presidency, which has been largely defined by his energetic support for a new Africa that is struggling to emerge.
Over the last two years, Mr. Wolfowitz has effectively directed the bank’s energies toward fighting poverty and improving human life. He is a champion of using international development institutions to deal with some of the world’s major problems.… Seguir leyendo »
"Daddy King" -- the Rev. Martin Luther King Sr. -- was always reminding us that "hate is too great a burden to bear." Even after a childhood of racist oppression and the cruel assassination of both his son Martin by white men and his wife by a deranged black man as she sat at the organ of Ebenezer Baptist Church playing the Lord's Prayer, he daily affirmed that we must never stoop to hate.
Yet I came closer to hating Paul Wolfowitz than I ever came to hating Bull Connor, the Ku Klux Klan or the killers of Martin Luther King Jr.… Seguir leyendo »
As the U.S. representative on the World Bank's board of executive directors, I formally nominated Alden Winship ("Tom") Clausen in 1980 to be the bank's sixth president. The outcome was never in doubt. Clausen was elected by acclamation. It has always been thus.
Since the World Bank was created at the end of World War II, the election of an American as president has never been seriously challenged. However, 51 years of unbroken American service at the helm of the largest international financial institution are in jeopardy, thanks to the ill-fated presidency of Paul Wolfowitz. This week, the European Parliament, in an unheard-of action, called for his resignation.… Seguir leyendo »
It's not the act itself, it's the hypocrisy. That's the line on Paul Wolfowitz coming from editorial pages around the world. It's neither: not the act (the way he disregarded the rules to get his girlfriend a pay rise); and not the hypocrisy (the fact that Wolfowitz's mission as World Bank president is fighting for "good governance").First, let's dispense with the supposed hypocrisy problem. "Who wants to be lectured on corruption by someone telling them to 'Do as I say, not as I do'?" asked one journalist. No one, of course. But that's a pretty good description of the game of one-way strip poker that is our global trade system, in which the United States and Europe - via the World Bank, the International Monetary Fund and the World Trade Organisation - tell the developing world: "You take down your trade barriers and we'll keep ours up."… Seguir leyendo »
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