Sunday, March 22, 2009

10 days to G20: a reading list that hopes to change the world

If you’ve been visiting my blog over the past week, when it turned daily, you would broadly know the issues confronting the heads of the 20 most powerful nations on earth today — how to get their economies going. That is, how to get banks to lend, industry to invest and households to buy, well, houses. So complex has the debate around resolving this global financial crisis (the first for this generation), so vested the interests (of countries, of bankers, of companies) and so wide and deep the consequences (from the US and Europe through Asia to Africa), that it has moved from global boardrooms to our bedrooms.
Nobody knows for sure how to resolve this crisis. Not economists, not policymakers, not politicians — and certainly not the bankers. But all are trying. Here’s what they are saying. More will follow over the next week.
1. The Washington Declaration. The story of the London Summit began with the Washington meet in November 2008. This November 15 statement from the heads of the G20 nations explored the causes of the financial crisis and listed out the “actions taken” and “to be taken”. They put together the common principles for reform of financial markets that included regulation, international regulatory cooperation, strengthening of international standards and their consistent implementation. They listed out five common principles for reform — strengthening transparency and accountability, enhancing sound regulation, promoting integrity in financial markets, reinforcing international cooperation and reforming international financial institutions.

Blog post on Cutting the Edge

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