September 1998

Can the IMF play supercop?


Must the IMF grow in size just to stomach the next bail-out, or should it reinvent itself as a tougher, global rating agency of countries and their banking systems? Such an IMF would not whisper advice into the ear of crony capitalists and then pay off their creditors - it would be a lean, mean agent of transparency and would deal out pain where pain is due. James Smalhout reports.


Global capital turns nasty
Too many risks, too few rewards
Capitalism and serfdom
The spectre of intervention
Throwing good money after bad
A breathing space for the IMF

If the IMF were a banker it would be unemployed. Battered and threadbare, 52 years old, it was created for and some would say still lives in a world that is long gone. Its coffers are empty. Several powerful department heads are preparing to retire. And turnover has been heavy among the few younger Fund staffers qualified to transfer to today's fast-moving capital markets.

Whether or not the IMF gets the $90 billion it needs in fresh capital from governments around the world, what the Fund does, when and how, are crucial questions for the global financial system. And plenty of heavyweights are pitching in with their views.

Henry Kaufman, president of the New York-based financial advisory firm which bears his name,...


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