Exit poll: What if we got to vote?

Our poll on who you think the worst candidate nominated for head of the Fund has the favourite bringing up the rear. Lagarde recieved 33.71% of the vote with Carstens on 24.72%. The rest was split between the no-runner and Mr Early Retirement

Though the end result is by now all too clear, the Board will likely keep us waiting until June 30th before putting out an official press release announcing Lagarde as the new IMF boss.

All in all a rather malagrugrous state of affairs. I’d say!

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Country positions: Which candidate will your government vote for?

With nominations in and lobbying winding down we want to know who you’d (dis)like to see as the head of the IMF [see sidebar].

But who will our governments be supporting?

Our friend Tony Fleming over at Global Memo has been keeping a tally of country position statements. Pick a country and see what they say. What’s more, if you’ve info that he hasn’t, why not help him fill in the blanks?

As well as documenting their position he notes each member state’s voting percentage to give us an idea of how much sway they have. But remember, it’s not the country’s individual voting share that counts per se but rather that of their country representative on the board.

Whilst the US, UK, France, Japan and Germany have their own seats, the remaining 182 members are represented by 19 country directors.

So while Fischer will get the backing of Israel, and Marchenko had the support of the Ukraine and other CIS states, their votes are cast by the Netherlands who early on in the process said “Europe should retain its traditional right to name the IMF chief”.

Sound fair?

With Lagarde gaining the vocal support of more countries by the day, the maths it seems, is also on her side…

Emerging markets play their cards close to their chest whilst Lagarde courts Latin America

Alan Beattie who last week took to twitter with “Dear Emerging Markets: Please stop wittering about open merit-based system for choosing new IMF MD and *nominate someone*. Love, The Media.” Continued to poke at what he sees as the emerging nations apparent lack of conviction and unity, evident in their inability to pick a candidate.

Patience Alan, they’re working on it.

The South African Finance Minister Pravin Gordhan, speaking on behalf of emerging nations reminded reporters that they had until June 10 to name a candidates and that “there’s lots of consultations going on. It’s work in progress.”

This may be the case but with Lagarde’s promotional tour in full swing their chosen candidate may find themselves playing catch up. She started the week in Brazil where she met with the Finance Minister Guido Mantega who early on was oft misreported as being happy with a European head. Brazil’s current stance is more reasoned, stating that they will examine all candidates before lending support although some suggest otherwise.  The Brazilians want reform and greater representation for emerging markets.  In Brasilia, Lagarde was certainly talking the talk, declaring “if I was elected, I’d make sure that the diversity of members is represented at all levels.”

Some history of the IMF MD selection process (since 2000)

I thought it might help to have some background on what has happened in the recent selection processes for IMF Managing Director (2000, 2004, 2007).  There have been several false starts in the effort to democratize the process, with comical post-process candidacies, symbolic nominations, and a “G11” of rebels on the IMF Board.  Stanley Fischer, Mohamed el-Erian, and Josef Tosovsky have been the unlikely vehicles for reformers’ hopes.  This post is somewhat longer than most, but I think there’s enough amusement to keep people reading ….