Resetting the International Monetary (Non)System: study prepared by the United Nations University World Institute for Development Economics Research (UNU-WIDER)

Abstract

International financial crises have plagued the world in recent decades, including the Latin American debt crisis of the 1980s, the East Asian crisis of the late twentieth century, and the global financial crisis of 2007-09. One of the basic problems faced during these crises is the lack of adequate preventive mechanisms, as well as insufficient instruments to finance countries in crisis and to overcome their over-indebtedness. 'Resetting the International Monetary (Non)System' provides an analysis of the global monetary system and the necessary reforms that it should undergo to play an active role in the twenty-first century and proposes a comprehensive yet evolutionary reform of the system. Criticising the ad hoc framework- a "(non)system"- that has evolved following the breakdown of the Bretton Woods arrangement in the early 1970's, 'Resetting the International Monetary (Non)System' places a special focus on the asymmetries that emerging and developing countries face, analysing the controversial management of crises by the International Monetary Fund and proposing a consistent set of reform proposals to design a better system of international monetary cooperation.