It is time to free the World Bank
Democracy begins at home. If the World Bank is to be a leading force in the promotion of good governance in developing countries, its own governance must move beyond backroom politics. The bank is now choosing a president. The first steps of this process have been unsatisfactory, based on the idea that the US can choose the president without competition and with no questions asked. Before the bank is further damaged, there is an urgent need to make amends.
In spite of the World Bank being a multilateral institution of 184 member governments, its presidency is widely assumed to be owned by the White House. Europe seems happy to play along, presumably to ensure its own “ownership” of other international posts. The 150-plus developing countries are relegated to the back benches.
The White House's perceived lock on the World Bank presidency is unsatisfactory for three reasons. First, the US has only 16 per cent of the bank's votes and other countries play an ever-larger role in its operations. Behind the scenes, the US has been the biggest brake on increasing the bank's finance for poor countries, and has pushed for debt relief in ways that would weaken bank finances. The US demands to run the bank but on the cheap.
Second, the US government stands aloof from the global consensus on economic development. The world has rallied behind the United Nation's Millennium Development Goals, the shared global objectives for cutting extreme poverty, disease and hunger. The US has signed the relevant documents but has refused to champion the goals.
The most egregious US lapse lies in foreign assistance. The conservative mantra in Washington is that the US supports the Monterrey consensus (adopted in the March 2002 conference that George W. Bush attended), rather than increased development assistance. The conservatives claim that the consensus is about trade and the private sector, not aid. This is wrong. The Monterrey consensus signatories, including the US, agreed to urge developed countries that have not done so “to make concrete efforts towards the target of 0.7 per cent of gross national product as official development assistance”. US aid stands at a mere 0.15 per cent of GNP, the lowest ratio of any donor country, around $65bn per year short of the Monterrey target. The US alone is responsible for half of the global financing shortfall in achieving the Millennium Development Goals, according to the recent report of the UN Millennium Project. Yet the Bush administration has so far shown no concrete efforts towards 0.7 per cent.
Third, the US has advanced an unlikely candidate for the World Bank position Paul Wolfowitz. Aside from all else that can be said of Mr Wolfowitz, his positions on crucial issues of global development are unknown. Mr Wolfowitz, after all, has spent a career on military matters and diplomacy, not on development and finance.
Europe, in spite of deep concerns, seems likely to accede to the US nomination. Developing countries, dependent on international aid, are more wary of speaking out. Yet, the bank's legitimacy will be damaged by a show of unlimited White House power over the appointment. Moreover, the hard-won consensus represented by the Millennium Development Goals may well be put at risk. For these reasons, serious due diligence by the bank's members and executive directors is needed.
Mr Wolfowitz and any other candidates put forward should be required to clarify their positions on at least four central issues of global development. This is especially the case given US “exceptionalism” on these issues.
First, does the candidate support the Millennium Development Goals? Would the president make these goals the operational targets of bank programmes? Second, does the candidate endorse the target of 0.7 per cent of GNP in official development assistance from all donor countries? Would the new bank president press the US and other donors to increase aid to 0.7 per cent by 2015, as advocated by world leaders and the report on UN reform by Kofi Annan, the secretary-general. Third, would the candidatechampion the call of free-market ideologues to privatise public health, education and infrastructure, or would he or she agree that increased public finance is vital to ensuring universal access to health, nutrition, water and sanitation, schooling and familyplanning?
Fourth, does the candidate support a bigger voice and vote for developing countries in the World Bank and International Monetary Fund, as is widely urged? This question is highly pertinent today, as poor countries are being told once again to swallow hard on any appointment that comes down from Washington. Is the World Bank to be truly a bank for the world, or simply the “American Bank”, as one Washington commentator put it last week?
The writer, director of the Earth Institute at Columbia University and the UN Millennium Project, is author of The End of Poverty (Penguin Press)
世界银行必须实行民主
民主要从自身做起。如果世界银行(World Bank)要在发展中国家成为促进良好治理的领导力量，那它自身的治理就必须摆脱幕后政治。眼下世界银行正在挑选行长。这一过程的第一步并不令人满意，因为美国能在没有竞争的情况下挑选行长，而不会受到任何质疑。在世界银行遭到进一步破坏之前，急需采取一些纠正措施。
尽管世界银行是由184个成员国组成的多边机构，但人们普遍假定，其行长位置是属于美国政府的。欧洲似乎乐于合作，大概是为了确保自己对其它国际职位的“所有权”。而150多个发展中国家被赶到了后排座位。
美国让人觉得霸占了世行行长一职，这点令人不服，原因有三：首先，美国仅拥有世行16%的投票权，而其它国家在世行运营中扮演着越来越大的角色。在幕后，美国一直是世行加大对贫穷国家援助的最大障碍，还敦促世行以各种方式免除债务，而那些方式会削弱世行的财力。美国要求掌管世行，但又不愿付出代价。
第二，对于有关经济发展的全球共识，美国政府置身度外。世界各国一致支持联合国的《千年发展目标》(Millennium Development Goals)，这是全人类在减少极端贫穷、疾病和饥饿方面的一些共同目标。美国签署了相关文件，但拒绝倡导这一目标。
美国最大的过错是在对外援助上。美国政府的保守派反复强调说，美国支持的是“蒙特雷共识”(Monterrey consensus)（该方案于2002年3月在联合国大会上表决通过，当时乔治?W?布什(George W. Bush)也参加了会议），而不是加大开发援助。保守派声称，“蒙特雷共识”是关于贸易和私人部门而不是关于援助。这种说法是错误的。“蒙特雷共识”要求发达国家“采取切实措施，达到官方开发援助占国民生产总值(GNP)0.7%的目标”。包括美国在内的签约国达成共识，敦促一些还没有这样做的发达国家行动起来。美国的援助仅占其国民生产总值的0.15%，这个比例在所有捐助国中是最低的，比蒙特雷共识每年的目标值低了约650亿美元。根据联合国千年项目(UN Millennium Project)最近公布的报告，在全球实现千年发展目标的资金缺口中，单美国一国就占了一半。但迄今为止，布什政府仍未表示要采取何种切实措施，来达到0.7%的目标。
第三，美国为世行推荐了一个不大可能的行长候选人保罗?沃尔福威茨(Paul Wolfowitz)。撇开沃尔福威茨先生的其它方面不谈，他在全球发展关键事务方面的立场无人知晓。毕竟，他的职业生涯是在军事和外交领域度过的，而不是在发展和金融领域。
尽管欧洲深表担忧，但似乎有可能赞同美国的提名。发展中国家由于依赖国际援助，因此在表态时会比较谨慎。但是，美国政府在行长任命方面显示出无限大的权利，这将破坏世行的正当性。此外，《千年发展目标》体现了各国的共识，这种来之不易的共识也会面临风险。出于这些原因，世行的成员和执行董事们有必要进行认真的尽职调查。
至少在4个全球发展的关键问题上，应该要求沃尔福威茨先生和任何其他被提名的候选人阐明立场。鉴于美国在这些问题上的“例外主义”，尤其需要这样做。
首先，候选人是否支持《千年发展目标》？新行长是否会把这些目标作为世行各项目的运作目标？第二，对于所有捐助国官方发展援助占其国民生产总值0.7%的目标，候选人是否赞同？新行长是否会对美国及其它捐助国施压，让它们像全球各领导者及联合国秘书长科菲?安南(Kofi Annan)的联合国改革报告所提倡的，在2015年前将援助增至国民生产总值的0.7%？第三，自由市场倡导者们呼吁，将公共卫生、教育和基础设施私有化，候选人对此是否支持？或者他（或她）是否同意，要确保民众普遍获得健康、营养、水和卫生、学校教育和计划生育服务，提高公共资助至关重要？
第四，人们普遍敦促，让发展中国家在世行和国际货币基金组织(IMF)内有更多发言权和投票权，候选人是否支持这种倡议？现在提出这个问题非常合宜，因为穷国正再次被告知，对于美国政府的任何任命，都要忍气吞声接受。世界银行真是一家为世界服务的银行，还是像一位华盛顿评论员上周所说的，仅仅是“美国的银行”？
作者系哥伦比亚大学地球研究所(Earth Institute at Columbia University)院长和联合国千年项目(UN Millennium Project)主任，《贫穷的终结》(End of Poverty)(企鹅出版社)一书的作者。
