March 2005

Patrick Bond
South Africa

The debate continues on whether to oppose Wolfowitz' appointment or consider it "a delightful turn of events".

Patrick Bond explains why Wolfowitz' is an excellent choice (in an email from debate@lists.kabissa.org)...

There are plenty of us:

* who would de-legitimize the World Bank and will have a much easier time of it now;

* who have been worried about opportunistic NGO game playing with the Bank in the Joint Facilitation Committee, which will be far more difficult to justify now;

* who would more explicitly link our critique of neoliberalism to that of imperialism (since there was every reason to do so under Wolfy 1 given Iraq, Afghanistan and many other dubious lending relationships);

* who want to see the anti-war and global-justice movements unite in increasingly militant protests; and

* who support a greatly reduced commercial lending role by the Bank (a la the Meltzer Commission).