On February 18, Lebanon’s minister of finance nominated Ziad Hayek, an investment banker and expert on public-private partnerships. While the World Bank’s board of executive directors promised an “open, merit-based and transparent” process, Hayek was the only known challenger to the Trump administration’s nominee, David Malpass, former Bear Stearns chief economist, a US treasury official who was a negotiator for the recent IBRD/IFC capital increase, and currently a member of the US team working with their Chinese counterparts to resolve Donald Trump’s trade crisis.

Enthusiasm for Malpass seems restricted to various American conservative news outlets and commentators who support a nativist “American interests first” view of multilateralism, falsely accuse the Bank of corruption (a position Malpass has publicly taken in Congressional testimony), and see a reduction in lending to middle income countries—including and in particular, China—as urgent. This notion about China, and possibly other upper-middle-income countries like Turkey, is mistaken: “The World Bank is a bank, and it needs to be lending profitably to at least some of its borrowers. China serves that role very well,” Christopher Kilby, an economics professor at Villanova University, told Bloomberg. Slashing credit to China could also have unintended consequences for the World Bank’s efforts to combat global problems such as climate change. And it could leave the bank on the outside looking in, without influence over such major and controversial Beijing initiatives like Belt and Road.

Malpass will no doubt want to explain his positions on these matters in the context of the Bank’s long-standing global role beyond finance, in knowledge generation and translation, and as a convener on a broad range of global public goods. In the case of China, in particular, the World Bank’s long, trusted relationship continues to provide a deep, well-informed and collaborative perspective on China’s many, and formidable, development challenges. Continue reading →

Ziad Hayek has been nominated by Lebanon’s Minister of Finance. With a credible résumé and a diverse international track record in finance, Hayek reportedly has an American passport, too, if that matters to the Bank’s board: it shouldn’t, and it’s not in the five criteria they’ve set out.

It’s interesting that a governor from the constituency group headed by Merza Hussain Hasan, who, as the longest-serving executive director also serves as dean of the board. Merza presides over the transparent, open, and merit-based selection process we’ve been promised, alas unaided—or, depending on your perspective, unhindered—by an executive search firm. Pour mémoire, any governor may nominate anyone.

Also, as dean of the Board, Merza surely has an obligation to operate with clean hands on nominations, and on the process. If he is concerned about the Bank’s credibility, and the board’s, he should realize that an ‘open, merit-based and transparent’ process would be greatly bolstered by a competitive selection. He should be taking steps to tease other serious candidates to offer themselves, as Ziad Hayez, with the support of Lebanon’s finance minister, has. Continue reading →

CDG’s President Emeritus Nancy Birdsall didn’t call being World Bank president the hardest job in the world for nothing.

Personal traits are important.

Now that David Malpass is rumored to be the Trump Administration’s nominee to succeed Dr Kim, the Board’s fifth criterion “effective and diplomatic communication skills, impartiality and objectivity in the performance of the responsibilities of the position” goes without saying if you take the Board’s first four assessment criteria seriously.

Cheerleaders for financial recklessness that led to widespread adverse impact and expensive fixes without accountability need not apply. Modest in judgment in one’s profession or field of expertise, and learning from one’s mistakes, are essential. 

Partisan attachments are to be avoided. That includes campaign fundraising and giving bad advice that isn’t listened to. The line between blunt, and candidly descriptive and persuasive, is a difficult one. It needs to be clear. 

No pettiness or abusing of subordinates. Tone at the top matters. So does respect for expertise, experience, and perspective.  Continue reading →

More than a bland statement, the Board’s fourth criterion, “a firm commitment to and appreciation for multilateral cooperation”, is particularly important at this inflection point in global development and geopolitics.

As Gilly Wright has reminded us—again—“Since the inception of the World Bank, Europe has backed the US choice of an American to head it, while the US in return leaves Europe to pick a European to head the IMF—a tradition that now seems unnecessary and outdated. Donald Trump’s anti-multilateral stance and antagonism toward Europe will perhaps see the end to this “gentlemen’s agreement,” and it remains to be seen if the Trump administration will resist the urge to nominate a lackey in favor of a globally respected candidate, and whether a non-funding stick will be wielded.”

This defeatist view has an element of realism: as long as the Eurozone’s economy remains fragile and risky, Europe is unlikely to relinquish leadership of the IMF, which will have to play a key role in Greece, Spain and Italy by lending its credibility to a EU-crafted solution led by the European Central Bank and Germany.

Against this background, the Trumpian view of “multilateralism” means many things, from bullying NATO allies to pay up more for collective defense, to withdrawing from important international agreements like the Paris Accord and TPP, and renegotiating—with much fanfare and little practical change—important regional and bilateral trade pacts, the noisiest one being NAFTA 2, for lack of a more mellifluous acronym.  Continue reading →