Making Sense of Greek Austerity

The process of approving a Greek drawing on funds provided by the international community is now familiar. There is concern about the prospect of securing an agreement between the International Monetary Fund (IMF), the European Union (EU), the European Central Bank (ECB), and Greece, which satisfies all parties. This paper suggests that all parties to the agreement have interests in an orderly resolution of the Greek crisis that keeps Greece in the Eurozone. Furthermore, it argues that disagreements and delay before eleventh‐hour agreements can best be explained politically. The paper first demonstrates how Greece, the IMF, and the EU each have a clear interest in finding an orderly solution to the Greek crisis that allows it to remain in the Eurozone. It then outlines the incremental nature of the package and its strategic benefit both for the European banking sector, and governments in Greece and the Eurozone more broadly.     

从IMF总裁卡恩案看国际组织的豁免权

国际组织的职能性豁免是随着联合国的建立而确立起来的。国际组织豁免是一种职能性豁免,意味着国际组织职员只有在从事公务行为时才享有豁免权。职能必要是判断公务行为与非公务行为的主要标准。在卡恩案中,卡恩的行为纯属私人事务,与公务职能无关,故不受豁免的保护。     

After Bananas: The IMF and the Politics of Stabilisation and Diversification in Dominica

Dominica was the quintessential banana island but now faces a major turning point in its history caused by the changing position of this crop within the global political economy. As the decline of its banana industry generated a major economic crisis, it was forced in 2002 to make a desperate turn towards the International Monetary Fund (IMF). It has remained under IMF supervision ever since, but has at last begun to chart the bases of a post‐banana development strategy under the leadership of Roosevelt Skerrit, projected into the leadership of his country at an early age by the death of his predecessor but since re‐elected to office in May 2005.     

Are economic forecasts of the International Monetary Fund politically biased? A public choice analysis

The paper shows that the economic forecasts of the IMF are frequently distorted by political bias. Longer-term growth forecasts for the industrial countries reveal an absolute as well as relative optimism bias and a significant correlation with election dates in the US. Furthermore, the IMF projections for the developing regions are strongly biased toward optimism. The significant relationship between forecast errors and IMF net credit flows to a region supports the hypothesis that the IMF staff tries to legitimize its lending activities with overly optimistic forecasts.

IMF conditionality: An approach based on the theory of special interest politics

Financial assistance provided by the International Monetary Fund (IMF) and other International Financial Institutions (IFIs) aims to help member countries reduce their economic policy distortions. Because these distortions are endogenously generated, it is important to understand how IFI assistance interacts with the domestic political economy. In this paper, we review recent models of IFI conditional assistance that are based on the theory of special interest politics (Grossman and Helpman 2001). In these models, governments adopt inefficient economic policies and instruments because of lobbying by interest groups. IFI assistance helps reduce these inefficiencies, at least under perfect and symmetric information, and provided IFIs are representative of the general public in creditor and debtor countries. Factors limiting the effectiveness of conditional assistance as an incentive system are also identified. These are related to information asymmetries, the potential for political instability in debtor countries, and the IFIs’ own financial solvency.

Argentina: Up a Blind Alley Once Again

This article attempts to respond to a simple question: What are the factors which caused the December crisis and whether or not they have been defused since president Duhalde came to power? The answer, by contrast, does not appear to be so straightforward. After analyzing a broad range of causes, some of which were thought of as harbingers of democratic breakdown and some which are considered driving forces of the current instability, this article points out two combined causes in the Argentinean crisis: the fragmentation of the politico–institutional system and the extreme dependency of its economy on foreign credit. Given the fact that both reasons cannot be fully understood simply in terms of historical precedent, the article also looks at what is new in this case.     

后冷战时代的美国制度霸权与国际经济机制——以国际货币基金组织为视角

后冷战时代,美国逐渐调整其霸权方式,从传统的权势霸权转向制度霸权,以支撑其更大、更广的霸权目标.国际货币基金组织(IMF)作为掌管国际金融体系的重要国际经济机制,成为美国维持和巩固霸权地位的有力工具.美国通过或正式或隐性的权力对IMF进行渗透和主导,在IMF公益性和权威性的外表下潜藏着美国霸权的利益驱动和价值取向.     

IMF program compliance: Aggregate index versus policy specific research strategies

Consensus has grown that the economic reform programs of the International Monetary Fund (IMF) have failed to promote economic development. There is little consensus about how IMF programs should be reformed, however, because we do not understand why IMF programs have failed. Some critics contend that the IMF’s austere policy conditions are inappropriate for most program-countries and cause economic crises to deepen. Other critics argue that the policy conditions are actually ignored, and the IMF program loan ends up subsidizing the bad policies that caused the economic crises in the first place. This debate begs the compliance question. Unfortunately, the study of IMF compliance is not straightforward. IMF agreements span many dimensions, and the dimensions vary from agreement to agreement. Even along one dimension, governments are not held to the same standard. Rather than look at aggregate measures of compliance, this article proposes a return to studying specific conditions as was done in the earliest studies on IMF compliance.      

一国汇率义务与IMF职能——国际货币法视角下的人民币汇率问题

在牙买加体系下IMF的成员国有权选择汇率安排,有权确定和管理其货币汇率,但须遵守《IMF协定》所规定的义务,不得通过操纵汇率取得对其它成员国的不公平竞争优势。为了防范各国选择汇率安排的自由可能给国际货币体系带来的危害,IMF强化了对其成员国的政策的监督职能,并辅之以相应的执行措施。《IMF协定》规定的汇率义务和IMF职权构成衡量IMF成员国汇率义务的基准,以此审视,我国的人民币汇率制度符合IMF的规定和要求,不存在汇率操纵。     

Domestic actors and liberalization: a case study of internal and external pressures in Moi's Kenya

The diffusion of political and economic liberalization to countries all across the world over the last 30 years has raised questions about the influence of domestic and international actors. Most scholars have given credit to international actors such as the USA, Western European countries, the International Monetary Fund (IMF), and the World Bank for the spread of liberalization or any political openness and/or market-oriented reform. Their external-actors-focused explanations have been almost exclusively at the expense of domestic actors. They have essentially viewed domestic actors as simply receivers of liberalizing change or incapable of initiating reform. As a result, international development policies and programs have tended to focus on what these external actors can do to force other countries to liberalize. While recognizing the influence of these external actors, this article reverses this emphasis and notes that the focus should be on internal actors and factors, primarily social movements/groups and opposition political polities that are agitating for reform. This article is a case study on Kenya that shows how domestic factors and actors pressured the Moi government to embrace reform starting in the 1980s.