Contents

List of Official Websites

List of NGO Websites

List of the Bretton Woods institutions.

List of Other Important Organisations in the Politics of International Finance

List of the main events at the 2001 Spring Meetings

List of the main events at the 2001 Fall Meetings

List of the main events at the 2002 Spring Meetings

Copyright Peter Willetts, 2003.
Note the links were all last tested on 17 May 2003.
The text of this website is subject to Copyleft - it may be freely used for any non-commercial purpose
provided that the author and the website address are cited.
 

Official Websites (see below for NGO websites)

www.imf.org   The International Monetary Fund, for a wealth of press releases and IMF policy documents, including much information about individual countries.

www.worldbank.org   The World Bank, for a wide range of Bank press releases and policy documents. Not as open as the Fund about individual countries, but covering a wide range of development issues.

wbln0018.worldbank.org/essd/essd.nsf/NGOs/home   Access to the World Bank site for "Non-Governmental Organisations and Civil Society".

www.worldbank.org/data/wdiYEAR/index.htm   Access to the text and tables of the World Development Indicators.     2000     2001     2002    

www.developmentgoals.org   A World Bank site, for information on the Millennium Development Goals. (It previously covered their predecessors, the International Development Targets.) An invaluable teaching tool.

www.paris21.org/betterworld   The June 2000 report A Better World for All.

www.unesco.org/education/efa/index.shtml    Documentation on the adoption of and follow-up to the Framework for Action on Education for All, adopted at a UNESCO conference in Dakar in April 2000.

www.gefweb.org   The Global Environment Facility, for full coverage of its policy-making in financing work to protect the global environmental commons.
On 17 May 2003, the GEF home page would not load in Netscape, but the address is correct.

World Bank list of web bulletins   This covers both the Bank's own newsletter aimed at NGOs and a list of fifteen NGO websites, most of which are highly critical of the World Bank.  

www.g24.org   The Intergovernmental Group of 24 on International Monetary Affairs, for developing country perspectives.

NGO Websites (see above for official websites)

www.aidc.org.za     Alternative Information for Development Centre, a research, education and campaigning NGO on issues affecting the development process in South Africa.

www.attac.org   ATTAC - Association pour la Taxation des Transactions financières pour l'Aide aux Citoyens, founded in France in June 1998 by a broad coalition of civil society groups and then became a global network. Campaigns, in particular, for the introduction of the Tobin Tax, but also, more generally, against financial globalisation.

www.bankwatch.org   Central and Eastern European NGO Network Monitoring Activities of International Financial Institutions, pays particular attention to the European Bank for Reconstruction and Development.

www.bicusa.org   A Washington-based NGO, the Bank Information Centre. Advocates transparency, accountability and civil society participation in the multilateral development banks.

www.brettonwoodsproject.org   A London-based independent information centre that covers both the Fund and the Bank and all the global activities that are relevant to their work. Includes editions of their valuable newsletter, since January 1998.

www.ChallengeGlobalization.org   The Citizens' Network on Essential Services (CNES), formerly the Globalization Challenge Initiative, a Washington-based NGO that acts as a focal point to organise NGO activities in relation to the Fund and Bank. It has more of a country focus.

www.coc.org/focus/?ID=902 (formerly www.coc.org/rbw.htm)   Rethinking Bretton Woods Project. The Center of Concern was founded in May 1971, as a response by US Catholics to a statement on Justice in the World by the Rome Synod of Bishops. The Project on the Bretton Woods Institutions was started in 1994.

www.developmentgap.org   The Development Group for Alternative Policies (D-GAP), a Washington-based group with good links to countries of the South.

www.dropthedebt.org now transfers to www.debtlinks.org/   One of the London-based successors to the British branch of Jubilee 2000. Its work ended on 31 July 2001. The Drop the Debt site was maintained as an archive for a while, but it no longer operates. Debt Links is a useful listing of international, regional and country-based websites on developing country debt issues.

www.eurodad.org   The European Network on Debt and Development (EURODAD), covering NGOs in sixteen countries.

www.50years.org   The Network for Global Economic Justice, a radical coalition of over 200 diverse US organisation, founded in 1994, to campaign under the slogan Fifty Years is Enough.

www.focusweb.org   Focus on the Global South, a radical programme of policy research, based in Chulalongkorn University, Bangkok.

www.foe.org/camps/intl/institutions/index.html.   Work on "Greening International Financial Institutions" by the International Programme of the US section of Friends of the Earth. (Formerly www.foe.org/international/finance).

www.globenet.org/ifi   Les associations à l'initiative du programme pour la reforme des institutions financieres internationales, a coalition of three Paris-based NGOs. This is a French language website.

www.jubilee2000uk.org    Jubilee Research, a successor to the Jubilee 2000 UK campaign, based at the New Economics Foundation in London.

www.jubileesouth.org    Jubilee South, a network of anti-debt Southern NGOs. (Formerly at www.jubileesouth.net).

www.oxfaminternational.org now transfers to www.oxfam.org/eng   A Washington-based advocacy office, operating on behalf of the Oxfam organisations in eleven countries.

www.saprin.org    Structural Adjustment Participatory Review Initiative Network (SAPRIN). A network of NGOs that worked with the World Bank to assess the impact of structural adjustment at the grass-roots in eight countries (Bangladesh, Ecuador, El Salvador, Ghana, Hungary, Mali, Uganda and Zimbabwe). It has since expanded to cover a few other countries. The network rigorously maintains its independent role as a voice for civil society. A secretariat is provided by D-GAP (see above).

www.twnside.org.sg   Third World Network, a radical advocacy group, based in South East Asia, but with a global impact.

www.september30.org/s30   Mobilization for Global Justice, (or Globalize This), a website for a coalition of different US NGOs and anti-globalisation groups, who organised the demonstration in Washington, during the 2001 Annual Meetings of the IMF and the World Bank.

The Bretton Woods Institutions

The International Monetary Fund

• Founded in 1944, by the Bretton Woods Conference, started operating 1947. Deals with the international financial system and each country's macro-economic policy, particularly its exchange rate.

The World Bank

• International Bank for Reconstruction and Development founded with the IMF at Bretton Woods, initially invested in projects to rebuild Europe after World War II. Now financing the middle-income developing-country government projects and programmes on commercial terms.

• International Development Association formed in 1960, to finance government projects and programmes in poorer developing-country on concessional terms.

Other Institutions in the "World Bank Group"

• International Finance Corporation, formed in 1956, to finance private investment in all developing countries.

• Multilateral Investment Guarantee Agency, formed in 1988, in response to the debt crisis, to promote investment in developing countries, by providing guarantees against non-commercial risks.

• The International Centre for the Settlement of Investment Disputes, formed in 1996, to encourage investment, by providing conciliation, arbitration and legal services.

Other Important Organisations in the Politics of International Finance

• The Group of 24 was set up in 1972 by the Group of 77 developing countries, with eight finance ministers from each of the three regions, Africa, Asia and Latin America and the Caribbean. Now there are nine from Africa and seven from Asia, as South Africa has taken the Yugoslav "Asian" seat.

• The Group of 7 consists of the leading industrial countries - the USA, Japan, Britain, Canada, France, Germany and Italy. It started meeting in 1975. From 1997, Russia has been included in the annual heads of government meetings, but is not generally included when they meet as finance ministers.

• The Group of 10 was originally set up in 1962, by the countries listed in the G7 with Belgium, the Netherlands and Sweden, to augment the IMF's resources. Now it contains eleven members, because Switzerland joined the group in 1984.

• The Group of 20 The Group of 20 was set up on the initiative of the Group of Seven leading industrialised countries, at the Köln Summit in June 1999. The aim was "to establish an informal mechanism for dialogue among systemically important countries", in other words to broaden discussions to include all the major countries that could affect the stability of the international financial system. The nine largest developing countries, (Argentina, Brazil, Mexico, India, Indonesia, Korea, Saudi Arabia, Turkey and South Africa) plus Australia, China, Russia and the European Union were invited to join with the G7 and the heads of the Bretton Woods Institutions, as an expression of a desire to be more inclusive in policy-making. However, it still totally excludes the smallest and poorest of the developing countries. Three meetings of finance ministers and central bank governors have been held: 15-16 December 1999 in Berlin; 25 October 2000 in Montréal and 16 November 2001 in Ottawa. The meeting in 2001 was originally scheduled to be held in New Delhi.

• The Financial Action Task Force on Money Laundering (FATF) , was created by the G7 in 1989 and has since expanded to include 29 members, including 25 OECD countries (but not the five most recent members), along with Argentina, Brazil, Hong Kong and Singapore. It encompasses experts on finance, law, justice, regulation and law enforcement. It sets standards and assesses compliance with those standards. The FATF adopted 40 Recommendations for its members to apply. In 2000, they also adopted 25 criteria for assessment of non-member countries and then went on to list Russia, many off-shore banking centres and some other developing country jurisdictions as being non-compliant. Nineteen remain on the list currently (December 2001) and have been threatened with counter-measures, if they do not take legal action to maintain the integrity of their financial systems.

• Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD), formed in 1961, to promote general co-ordination of economic policy among the developed countries. Originally only had the US, Canada and 18 Western European countries as members. Other countries joined later - Japan in 1964; Finland in 1969; Australia in 1971; New Zealand in 1973; Mexico in 1994; the Czech Republic in 1995; Hungary, Poland and South Korea in 1996; and Slovakia in 2001.

• The Eurogroup consists of those member countries of the European Community that have adopted the Euro as their common currency. They are Austria, Belgium, Finland, France, Germany, Greece, Ireland, Italy, Luxembourg, Netherlands, Portugal and Spain. The term also refers to the meetings of the Finance Ministers from these twelve countries.

• ECOFIN is the Council of Ministers of the European Community meeting as Finance Ministers. It includes all the fifteen members of the Community, the Eurogroup members plus Denmark, Sweden and the United Kingdom. (Note that in international institutions it is the European Community and not the European Union that has legal personality.)

Copyright Peter Willetts, 2001.
The text of this website is subject to Copyleft - it may be freely used for any non-commercial purpose provided that the author and the website address are cited.
 

The Main Events at the Spring Meetings 2001

Thursday 26 April

• Michael Mussa, IMF Research Director, launches World Economic Outlook.

Friday 27 April

• Drop the Debt and Oxfam International "Pre-Wolfensohn Press Conference".

• Press conference with James Wolfensohn, World Bank President.

• Press conference with Horst Köhler, IMF Managing Director.

• Bono of U2, telephone press conference calling for 80% debt cancellation.

• Press briefing by World Bank Vice-President for Latin America and the Caribbean.

Saturday 28 April

• Press conference with five African finance ministers.

• Meeting of the Group of 24 – followed by a press conference.

• Meeting of the Group of 7 – followed by separate press conferences with Wim Duisenberg, President of the European Central Bank, and Paul O'Neill, the US Treasury Secretary.

Sunday 29 April

• Meeting of the Group of 10, but no press conference.

• Nick Stern, World Bank Chief Economist, launches the World Development Indicators.

• Meeting of the International Monetary and Financial Committee – followed by a press conference with Gordon Brown, the IMFC Chairman and Horst Köhler, IMF Managing Director.

• Joint Meeting of the IMFC and the Development Committee – followed by a press conference with Gordon Brown, the IMFC Chairman, Yashwant Sinha, Development Committee Chairman, and Horst Köhler, IMF Managing Director.

• Anti-globalisation demonstration outside the headquarters buildings of the Bank and the Fund.

Monday 30 April

• Lennart Båge, President of the International Fund for Agricultural Development launches the Rural Poverty Report.

• Meeting of the Development Committee – followed by a press conference with the Chairman, Yashwant Sinha, and James Wolfensohn, World Bank, President.

The Fund-Bank Fall Meetings in Ottawa, November 2001, and Associated Events Elsewhere

Saturday 6 October

• Meeting of the Finance Ministers and Central Bank Governors of the Group of Seven, industrialised countries – held in Washington.

Tuesday 13 November

• Press conference of African Finance Ministers, from Uganda, Burkina Faso, Niger, Nigeria and Madagascar – held in Washington.

Wednesday 14 November

• Ministerial Meeting of the Group of 24, the financial sub-group of the G77 developing countries, followed by a press conference – held in Paris.

Thursday 15 November

• Press conference with Horst Köhler, IMF Managing Director – held in Washington.

Saturday 17 November

• Meeting of the Finance Ministers and Central Bank Governors of the Group of 20, followed by a press conference by the Canadian Finance Minister, Paul Martin.

• Meeting of the International Monetary and Financial Committee, followed by a press conference with Gordon Brown, the IMFC Chairman, and Horst Köhler, IMF Managing Director.

• Meeting of Paul Martin, Gordon Brown and Yashwant Sinha with NGOs.

• IMFC and Development Committee joint dinner discussion with Kofi Annan on globalisation and preparations for the Financing for Development conference.

Sunday 18 November

• Meeting of the Development Committee, followed by a press conference with the Chairman, Yashwant Sinha, the President of the World Bank, James Wolfensohn, and the IMF Deputy Managing Director, Anne Krueger.

The normal meeting of the leading Western industrialised economies, the Group of 10, the Joint Meeting of the IMFC and the Development Committee, the Boards of Governors, the seminar programme, the presentations of annual reports and specialised press conferences, all did not take place.

The Main Events at the Spring Meetings 2002

Wednesday 17 April

• Horst Köhler, IMF Managing Director, speech to National Press Club, Washington DC.

Thursday 18 April

• Kenneth Rogoff, IMF Research Director, launches World Economic Outlook.

Friday 19 April

• Press conference with James Wolfensohn, World Bank President.
• Meeting of the Group of 24, the financial sub-group of the G77 developing countries – followed by a press conference.

Saturday 20 April

• Press conference with five African finance ministers.
• Nick Stern, World Bank Chief Economist, launches the World Development Indicators.
• Meeting of the G7, the leading Western industrialised economies – followed by a press conference with Paul O'Neill, the US Treasury Secretary.
• Meeting of the International Monetary and Financial Committee – followed by a press conference with Gordon Brown, the IMFC Chairman and Horst Köhler, IMF Managing Director.
• Main "Mobilize for Global Justice" demonstration (merged with Middle East peace and Colombia Mobilization demonstrations).

Sunday 21 April

• World Bank Press Conference on the Education for All programme
• Meeting of the Group of 10, the G7 countries, plus Belgium, the Netherlands, Sweden and Switzerland.
• Financial Sector Reform and Strengthening Initiative (FIRST) Press Conference
• Meeting of the Development Committee – followed by a press conference with the Chairman, Trevor Manuel (South Africa), and James Wolfensohn, World Bank, President.

Monday 22 April

• Special high-level meeting of ECOSOC with the Bretton Woods institutions, in New York