A New Multilateralism for the 21st Century
the Richard Dimbleby Lecture - Christine Lagarde, Director IMF

Synopsis

The lecture delivered by Christine Lagarde, Managing Director of IMF on 3rd of February, presents a snapshot of the main pressures which will dominate the global economy in coming years . The director starts of touching upon the hyperconnected nature of the world of today. Doing so, she draws attention to the potential threats it poses in future.

As she says; "When linkages are deep and dense, they become hard to disentangle. In such an interwoven labyrinth, even the tiniest tensions can be amplified, echoing and reverberating across the world-often in an instant, often with unpredictable twists and turns. The channels that bring convergence can also bring contagion."

In addition to the difficulties from growing interconnectedness, like many others she sees complexities springing out of the tensions in economic sustainability. However, Christine departs from the traditional IMF explanation of economic sustainability, and mentions three long term impediments namely demographics, environmental degradation and income inequality. According to her, the global growth patterns are going to change in response to the changing population pool of the countries; while talking about aging vs. young countries she does not forget to mention the migration factor. She sees inequality as a bigger problem in future as it was in the past therefore; she proposes that "inclusion" should outweigh "growth" agenda in future policies.

She also proposes a solution in the form of new multilateralism "A Multilateralism for a New Era" in which bodies like the IMF will play a vital role to help countries act as one global family. The solution lies in accepting social responsibility on part of all the players to solve problems beyond borders and territories. Cooperation is essential if we want to eradicate issues like climate change and inequality, as no one country can get rid of these issues on its own. However, she understands the problems in attaining this mutual cooperation and remains pragmatic. In her words. "the kind of 21st century cooperation I am thinking of will not come easy. It might get even harder as time passes, when the curtains fall on this crisis, when complacency sets in-even as the seeds of the next crisis perhaps are being planted."

Related Link:
http://www.imf.org/external/np/speeches/2014/020314.htm