The global financial crisis and new financial architectures for development (second part)

Abstract

In the second of two parts, this article paints a financial panorama of the institutional agreements for financial integration in Africa through the East African Community. The Arab Monetary Fund is the determinant influence in this economic zone. The author highlights how before the current crisis, the Asian Development Bank already lent more in the region than the World Bank, much as the Inter-American Development Bank and the Fondo Latinoamericano de Reservas were providing more crisis-related financing in South America than the International Monetary Fund. The multilateral regional development banks and bilateral financial initiatives in the developing world, like the bilateral currency swaps, along with other types of official development assistance to countries in development, have overtaken in size international financial organisms such as the World Bank. This has created a countercyclical role whose importance could represent a great transformation in the financial architecture for countries in the global south.