Well, it seems that geographers no longer live on the periphery of economic policy. The [World Bank](http://www.worldbank.org/”World Bank”)’s new [World Development Report](http://siteresources.worldbank.org/INTWDR2009/Resources/Outline.pdf”World Development Report Outline”) is on the topic of spatial disparities and development policy. Having looked through the outline, it seems that they have been reading too much Paul Krugman, and perhaps not enough of anything else in economic geography. But more on that later.

Forget about invading Iraq! Forget about the needless deaths of “thousands”:http://www.iraqbodycount.org/ of civilians. It seems that the end to Paul Wolfowitz’s career will be due to a “raise”:http://www.nytimes.com/2007/04/16/washington/16bank.html?_r=1&ref=business&oref=slogin improperly given to his girlfriend. It’s good to see that the ethicists are all hard at work.

Hillary Benn, Britain’s international development secretary, can called for Europe and the US to relinquish their hold on the Presidencies of the World Bank and IMF.

The Guardian quotes him below:

“Perhaps we should move towards a rules and merit-based process for appointing the senior management of all the international financial institutions…Is it really acceptable that the presidencies of the World Bank and the IMF should be restricted to European and US nationals respectively, because of a cosy deal made 60 years ago?”

The natural reaction is: finally!!!! That said the likelihood of US and Europe giving up their power over the institutions is next to nil.