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A battle is on-going over who will be nominated to head the World Bank with developing nations for the first time, taking a keen interest. As an unwritten rule, the President of the World Bank has always been an American citizen, while the International Monetary Fund has been led by only Europeans, even though the policies of these two global institutions have focused on poor countries in the Global South. After rumors of President Obama’s possible choice for the nominee of Larry Summers drew strong criticism, the US President officially nominated Jim Yong Kim, a Harvard-trained public health specialist. If he is indeed picked, Kim would be the first Asian American, and the first physician to be World Bank President. Jeffrey Sachs, a prominent international development expert was also being considered as the American nominee, and was a favorite among some progressives but withdrew his name, saying he supported Obama’s pick.

The final decision is made by the 25 World Bank Executive Board members. Because the US is the largest donor to the bank, it controls a majority of seats on the board. The Washington Post speculated that “by nominating an Asian-born development expert, rather than an American-born U.S. political figure, the White House may take some of the sting out of its effort to keep an American in the top spot.” Developing nations have put forward their own nominees: Nigeria’s Finance Minister Ngozi Okonjo-Iweala was nominated by South Africa, Angola and Nigeria. Colombia’s former finance minister, Jose Antonio Ocampo, has also been offered up as a candidate for the position. Ocampo has a PhD in Economics from Yale, and was tipped by a Financial Times blogger as being the most qualified candidate.

GUEST: Stephany Griffith-Jones, Financial Markets Program Director at the Initiative for Policy Dialogue at Columbia University