Ethos Perspectives
The Future of International Financial
Institutions
Reference 4: "The World Bank’s
Mission Creep" by Jessica Einhorn
Jessica Einhorn argues that the mandate of the World Bank
has expanded beyond its operational capabilities and the Bank
needs to redefine its mission to something more manageable.
A broad array of options can be considered for reform of the
World Bank, including devolving some of its functions to other
institutions.
The founding mission of the World Bank was
to help countries in their postwar reconstruction and poor
countries in their economic development efforts. Under the
pressure of many different constituencies, the World Bank’s
agenda has expanded to include issues of governance, anti-corruption,
participation of the poor and other stakeholders, poverty
alleviation and environment sustainability. Einhorn believes
that this grand but unachievable vision drowns out a discussion
of more realistic objectives and the need to enhance internal
management. Reform may involve breaking up the bank, scaling
back its activities or devolving some of its functions to
other institutions. Most importantly, the World Bank needs
to modernise and rationalise the proliferated development
architecture for any attempts at reform to succeed.
Einhorn, Jessica. "The World Bank’s
Mission Creep". Foreign Affairs Sep/Oct 2001. http://www.foreignaffairs.org.
Reference 5: "The White Man’s
Burden: Why The West’s Efforts To Aid The Rest Have
Done So Much Ill And So Little Good" by William Easterly
In this book, Easterly argues that the vast amounts of aid
provided by the West are doing more harm to impoverished countries.
The aid strategies adopted by the World Bank is supposed to
help alleviate poverty. Instead, billions of dollars poured
into developmental programmes have not yielded the intended
benefits. The conditions imposed on countries by the Bank
as a pre-requisite for aid are also often inappropriate and
impose a large burden on the poor country’s fragile
administrative resources. Easterly believes that the World
Bank would be able to operate better if it had a more modest
agenda to work with.
Easterly, William. The White Man’s
Burden: Why the West’s Efforts to Aid the Rest Have
Done So Much Ill and So Little Good. New York: The Penguin
Press, 2006. http://us.penguingroup.com.
Prepared by
Gabriel Wong
Research Associate
Institute of Policy Development, CSC
Adeline Mak
Senior Executive, Management Development
Institute of Policy Development, CSC
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