West’s dominance of IMF must end

The New Indian Express
Last Updated : 12 Jun 2011 11:24:04 PM IST

The sudden vacuum in the IMF’s seniormost position caused by its former managing director Dominique Strauss-Kahn’s arrest on charges of sexual misconduct has given an opportunity to recast the organisation’s hierarchical structure. There is undoubtedly a consensus outside the western hemisphere that the time has come to end the practice of having a European at the head of the IMF and an American at the World Bank by choosing a person from what is known as the developing countries to be the next IMF managing director.


The case for ending the European monopoly has already been made by the BRICS (Brazil, Russia, India, China and South Africa). Now, since the governor of the Mexican central bank, Agustin Carstens has thrown his hat into the ring, New Delhi should play a more proactive role in favouring his candidature. The stance will be in keeping with the role in resisting the West’s habitual hegemonic tendencies which India played in the time of Jawaharal Nehru, Indira Gandhi and Atal Behari Vajpayee. Any hint that New Delhi’s outlook is being influenced in this matter by the present perceptible tilt towards the US will be unfortunate.

It is difficult to assess in this context the veracity of the reports that an Indian minister made known his preference for the candidature of the French finance minister, Christine Lagarde. If so, New Delhi should reverse its stance even if Lagarde is seen as the odds-on favourite at the moment presumably because Europe’s and America’s clout still outweighs that of the “emerging countries”, to use Carstens’ phrase.

There is much to be said for the Mexican contender’s view that the 65-year-old ‘tradition’ of European dominance of IMF should end not because it had been so prolonged, but because of the rise of the non-European countries in the world economy. If this reality of a new global order was ignored, the IMF would lose its legitimacy