Bretton Woods Reappraised

The International Monetary Fund and the International Bank for Reconstruction and Development were established and have passed their infancy under a barrage of criticism. There were originally grave doubts as to the wisdom of creating the institutions at all. Four years of operations have been attended by a wide range of adverse comment, varying from attacks on the salary and allowance scale on the one hand, to accusations of perversion and misuse by the United States on the other. The main criticism has been, however, that the institutions were inadequate to meet the economic problems of the postwar world. Evidence for this may be found positively in the proposals for drastic revision of the articles and practice of both institutions put forward by an international group of experts in a United Nations report, and negatively by the recommendations of the Gray report, which calls for stabilization-fund loans to European countries to meet the problem once solved by the establishment of the Fund, and an expanded Point IV program, with additional funds for the Export-Import Bank, to assist the Bank in the discharge of its long-run task.