Who runs the IFIs?



Introduction

The major international financial institutions ---the World Bank Group (WB), the
regional development banks (Inter-American, Asian and African, European) and the
International Monetary Fund (IMF)-- are capital-based. The countries belonging to them
have shares in their capital1, which determine the relative weights of members in their
decision making.

Inside the IFIs, decisions are normally made either by a simple majority of shares (or
votes corresponding to them) or, for the most important ones by a qualified majority of
shares. In this respect the IFIs are fundamentally different than the UN-based
international organizations, where the “one country one vote” rule prevails, and the
World Trade Organization (WTO), where unanimity is the norm in decision-making.

Posing the question of “who runs the IFIs” may thus appear redundant, or even
provocative. The simple answer would seem to be: their shareholders, i.e. the majorities
of them that coalesce around the various issues under decision. The distribution of shares
and votes in the World Bank and the International Monetary Fund is shown in Table 1. It
is virtually identical in both institutions, and shows some notable features of the structure
of power inside both of them: G-7 countries do not hold a majority in the World Bank
and the IMF, but they come quite close to it, with 46% of the quotas. G-10 countries
jointly have it. Europe and North America are close to majority ownership in both
organizations. Practically all of the European quotas are held by EU member countries.
Industrial countries hold together nearly 61% of the shares and votes, Russia nearly 3%
and developing countries about 36%. Of the “non-industrialized” membership, the single
most important shareholder is Saudi Arabia, with above 3% of the votes (a large and
uncorrected anomaly arising from the brief period of “commodity power” in the 1970s,
when the IMF borrowed resources from oil-exporting countries, and Saudi Arabia in
particular). After it, come China (3%), India (2%) and Brazil (1.4%), i.e. the large
developing countries. The regional development banks have, instead, region specific
distributions of shares and votes, with “non regional representation” in their capital.
European countries, for example, have capital shares in the Inter-American, Asian and
African Banks.

Yet, the majority rule that applies inside the IFIs leaves open other questions: are there
“normal” majorities (made up, for example, by one particular set of shareholders)? Are
there blocking minorities, or even single members with blocking power? These questions
are as legitimate as they would be for any similar public company, national or
international. In many respects they are also core questions, since the IFIs are
international in nature and their members, and shareholders, are sovereign states. In these
circumstances therefore, when one thinks of majorities of shareholders, or blocking
minorities of them, one necessarily configures coalitions of states represented by their
governments, and thus inherently political coalitions. The limit situation is when a single
shareholder (i.e. a single country) has the power to prevent the institution as a whole from

1 Technically called “quotas” .



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