Ghotala.in

Exclusive Interview Of Imf Head Christine Lagarde

The news blowing in from across the Atlantic, as often happens these days, brought the smell of disaster like an approaching hurricane. The credit scores of France and eight other European countries had just been knocked down. Negotiations to bail out an all-but-bankrupt Greece had stalled, or died—it wasn’t clear which.

Christine Lagarde, the former French finance minister who has been at the top of the fund since last summer, sat at the head of the oblong ring of seats in a conference room lined with portraits of past IMF managing directors, all of them men. (Her immediate predecessor, Dominique Strauss-Kahn, resigned in the midst of a sex scandal last May; his painting has yet to be put up.) Lagarde listened calmly as the 24 representatives of 187 different countries took in the bleak news, delivered by one of her key aides. Good, she thought. The staff, which has its antennae everywhere, told what the whole truth is. From her point of view, that made it a positive meeting. “Telling truth is our job,” she said. There is still time to prevent a second collapse, she believes. But not much time.

Lagarde’s mind was already turning to the speech she will deliver in Berlin this week, warning of dire consequences if Europe, America, China, and others do not find better ways to work together to stabilize the world economic system. Nobody at the fund wants to use the phrase “global depression”; instead, they talk about a “defining moment” or a “1930s moment.” But everyone knows what they mean: massive job losses, political unrest, chaos.Source