Introduction: The IMF and Global Financial Governance

Abstract

This book investigates the changing nature of the policies adopted to promote global financial stability. Specifically, the book investigates the evolution of the policies that member countries requested the International Monetary Fund (IMF) to follow in the aftermath of the Mexican crisis (1994–95), the Asian crisis (1997–98), and the subprime crisis (2007–8). In doing so, the book attempts to explain the puzzle of policy change that led member countries to move away from the post-Mexican policies aimed at fostering global financial stability through a concentration of powers in the IMF to the post-Asian policies that endorsed a decentralized system of governance where market actors played a crucial role. In the aftermath of the subprime crisis, the international policies designed to govern the risks associated with growing financial integration seem to have shifted again towards a form of centralization with a revival of the role of the Fund in crisis prevention and management.