Camdessus says...

[Doug Henwood]

The July 6 issue of the IMF Survey, the Fund's biweekly PR sheet (available
at <http://www.imf.org/external/pubs/ft/survey/pdf/070698.PDF>) has a
speech by managing director Michel Camedessus to the Council of Europe,
"Asian Crisis Intensifies Need for A New Global Architecture." (The IMF has
been fond of architectural metaphors in recent months.) What are the
features of this new architecture? According to Camdessus, they should be
(all italicized in the original):

* "make IMF surveillance more effective and to enhance transparency in
international finance"

* "financial and banking systems, as well as their supervision, must be
strengthened"

* "establish more effective procedures to involve the private sector in
preventing and resolving debt crises"

and, the clincher

* "continue to liberalize international capital flows" Not in a "mad rush,"
but in an "orderly" fashion, of course.

Doug