Just Published: "International Financial Institutions (IFIs) and Sovereign Wealth Funds"

 

I am pleased to announce the publication of the article, "International Financial Institutions (IFIs) and Sovereign Wealth Funds" which has been published in the International Review of Law (Qatar) vol. 2015.

The abstract follows along with the other articles that make up the symposium in which it appears.  All of the articles are open source and may be downloaded.  Special thanks  to the issue's Guest Editor, Joel Slawotsky, of the Radzyner School of Law (IDC), Herzilya, Israel, Academic College of Law and Business, Ramat Gan, Israel, Haim Striks Law School, Rishon L’Zion, Israel, who has gone to every length to ensure the successful completion of this symposium issue



International Financial Institutions (IFIs) and Sovereign Wealth Funds (SWFs) as instruments to combat corruption and enhance fiscal discipline in Developing States
Larry Catá Backer
Pennsylvania State University, Dickinson School of Law, United States

Abstract

Especially since the start of the second decade of the twenty-first century, once more we have seen more focused interest in the use of SWFs by home states—less as a means of projecting sovereign financial power outwards and more as a means of internal financial management, and development. What makes this interesting from the perspective of SWF development is the role of International Financial Institutions (IFIs) in SWF development. This article takes a first look at the way in which IFIs have also begun to use SWFs in their interactions, with a emphasis on developing states. A review of some recent efforts to establish SWFs with a stabilization or development focus suggests the way in which these funds now may better serve the project of fiscal and governance internationalization, and the development of global policy coherence around the fiscal ideologies of IFIs, rather than as an instrument of national policy. Part II briefly sketches the IFI’s interest in and approach to SWFs as a part of their investment, capacity building and rule of law toolkits. Part III then reviews the manifestation of this approach in the development of SWFs in a number of developing states. The article suggests ways in which stabilization and development SWFs may better serve financial globalization than the particular interest of states establishing them precisely by transposing global standards of fiscal and governance behavior into the internal workings of states. In this sense, development and stabilization SWFs serve as an instrument of globalization from the top down (through IFI policy operationalization) perhaps as effectively as SWFs that seek to project national financial power through private market investments abroad. But it also creates the possibility of divergence in SWF character as the consequences of the use of SWFs as governance devices may produce substantial deviation from the traditional organizational parameters of SWFs as instruments of macroeconomic policy.

Keywords: International Financial Institutions; Sovereign Wealth Funds; corruption; fiscal discipline.

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VOLUME 2015

Foreword

3

Foreword from the Editor-in-Chief Abstract . . PDF (306 KB) . PDF with links(307 KB)

2

Guest Editor Foreword Joel Slawotsky Abstract . . PDF (227 KB) . PDF with links(228 KB)

1

Sovereign Wealth Fund Special Issue Guest Foreword Edwin M. Truman Abstract . . PDF (132 KB) . PDF with links(133 KB)

Research article

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Incipient activism of Sovereign Wealth Funds and the need to update United States securities laws Joel Slawotsky Abstract . . PDF (746 KB) . PDF with links(747 KB)

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Sovereign Wealth Funds: Problems of international law between possessing and recipient States Kazuhiro Nakatani Abstract . . PDF (543 KB) . PDF with links(544 KB)

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Sovereign Wealth Funds: Investors in search of an identity in the twenty-first century Locknie Hsu Abstract . . PDF (592 KB) . PDF with links(593 KB)

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International Financial Institutions (IFIs) and Sovereign Wealth Funds (SWFs) as instruments to combat corruption and enhance fiscal discipline in Developing States Larry Catá Backer Abstract . . PDF (702 KB) . PDF with links(703 KB)

4

CFIUS post-Ralls: Ramifications for sovereign wealth funds Anne W. Salladin, Amelia J. Schmidt Abstract . . PDF (636 KB) . PDF with links(637 KB)