Written by Washington Post columnist Sebastian Mallaby, this intriguing account explores the work of James Wolfensohn, president of the World Bank, who leads one the world's largest multilateral organizations.
Mallaby describes Wolfensohn, who took command of the institution in 1995, as bursting with energy and ready to tackle issues such as poverty, corruption, and debt relief, problems the World Bank was created to fix, but unable to because of regulations and organizational inertia.
Wolfensohn emerges as a larger-than-life character attempting to apply tactics from the private sector to streamline the unwieldy organization. The sledding isn't easy as he meets resistance from entrenched interests at the Bank, Washington policymakers, and from what he characterizes as feisty NGOs trying to "protect" the very people the World Bank intends to benefit.
"Jim Wolfensohn is the most ambitious man I know, and the Bank is the most ambitious institution," Mallaby writes. "A dreamer who wants to do everything in the world stands atop an organization that wants to change everything within it."
Mallaby covers both the beginnings of the man—Wolfensohn began his life trying to live up to the unrealistic expectations set by his parents, a pattern that continues today, the author says—as well as the Cold War origins of the World Bank.
This book should prove interesting to historians, policymakers, and executives with an interest in how to manage, or not manage, a complex organization.—Cynthia D. Churchwell
Table of Contents:
Preface: The Prisoner of Lilliput
Chapter 1: A Tale of Two Ambitions
Chapter 2: "World Bank Murderer"
Chapter 3: The Renaissance President
Chapter 4: A Twister in Africa
Chapter 5: Mission Sarajevo
Chapter 6: Narcissus and the Octopus
Chapter 7: The Cancer of Corruption
Chapter 8: Uganda's Myth and Miracle
Chapter 9: A Framework for Development
Chapter 10: From Seattle to Tibet
Chapter 11: Waking Up to Terror
Chapter 12: A Plague upon Development
Chapter 13: Back to the Future
Chapter 14: A Lion at Carnegie