The wolfensohn, wolfowitz, and zoellick presidencies: Revitalising the neoliberal agenda of the world bank

Abstract

This article analyses the World Bank presidencies of James Wolfensohn (1995–2005), Paul Wolfowitz (2005–2007), and Robert Zoellick (2007–2012) to review how the World Bank spent more than a decade attempting to renew the legitimacy of its neoliberal agenda that was widely denounced following the 1997 Asian Financial Crisis. It is the argument here that between the Asian Crisis and the 2008 Global Financial Crisis (GFC), the World Bank turned away from an aggressive and coercively conditional neoliberal approach towards a flexible, collaborative, and comprehensive neoliberal approach. Observing the norm entrepreneurs of the World Bank Presidents and Chief Economists, the major contribution of this article is to reveal that the World Bank has attempted in recent years to renew the legitimacy of its developmental mindset, while maintaining a market-centric mentality. The conclusion reached by this article is that the World Bank evolved in rhetoric and practice between the Asian Crisis and the GFC to revitalise its widely condemned (yet stalwartly maintained) neoliberal discourse.