Ernesto Zedillo, director of the Yale Center for the Study of Globalization, will chair a new High Level Commission to explore ways in which the World Bank can operate more effectively, efficiently, dynamically and legitimately in a transformed global political economy.
World Bank President Robert Zoellick, made the announcement in a speech on Monday at the Peterson Institute for International Economics in Washington. Speaking just days ahead of the Annual Meetings of the World Bank Group, Zoellick said that the multilateral system needs a fundamental overhaul and that the global financial crisis is pushing many developing countries toward a tipping point.
The World Bank Group, he said, “must also adapt more quickly to meet new needs of its clients and interests of its shareholders. We need to better align our governance with the realities of the 21st century.” He noted that in 1944 at Bretton Woods, the founding fathers of economic multilateralism took that moment to build a better future. “We must be no less ambitious today.”
“I am delighted that Ernesto Zedillo has agreed to lead this work. I have asked Ernesto to work with colleagues looking at governance issues at the IMF,” stated Zoellick in his speech.
The Yale Center for the Study of Globalization is devoted to examining the impact of our increasingly integrated world on individuals, communities, and nations. The center aims to bridge the gap between the worlds of academia and public policy and is particularly focused on practical policies to enable the world’s poorest and weakest citizens to share in the benefits brought by globalization.
As part of the Globalization Center’s effort to connect Yale and the policy world, Zedillo has served on a range of international commissions. He has chaired, among others, a commission to make recommendations on the future of the International Atomic Energy Agency (2007-2008); the Partnership for the Americas Commission (2007-present), examining common challenges for the U.S. and Latin America and offering recommendations on how those challenges might be met; and the Global Development Network (2005-present), a worldwide network of research and policy institutes that share and generate knowledge about development in and for developing countries. He serves on, among others, the International Commission on Nuclear Non-proliferation and Disarmament (2008-2010); the Commission on Growth and Development (2006-2008), making recommendations to leaders of developing countries for rapid and sustained economic growth and poverty reduction; the Commission on Legal Empowerment of the Poor (2005-2008), aiming to make legal protection and economic opportunity not the privilege of the few but the right of all; and the Club de Madrid’s High Level Task Force on Climate Change (2006-2008).
