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Vanderbilt Journal of Transnational Law

Authors

Joseph Gold

First Page

223

Abstract

In the recent past, the main activity of the International Monetary Fund in connection with the development of international law has been the negotiation and drafting of an amendment of the Fund's Articles of Agreement. The present report deals primarily with that activity, but also comments on the sixth general review of the quotas of member states in the Fund.

On August 15, 1971, the United States, having decided to free itself from certain constraints that had become unacceptable and to exercise greater autonomy for national policies, suspended the convertibility into gold or other reserve assets of balances of United States dollars held by the monetary authorities of other members of the Fund. This action made it clear that certain fundamental assumptions on which the Articles had been agreed at the Bretton Woods Conference in July 1944 were now disputable or even untenable. In due course, the Committee of the Board of Governors of the Fund on Reform of the International Monetary System and Related Issues (the Committee of Twenty), composed of Governors of the Fund, ministers, or others of comparable rank (such as governors of central banks), was appointed to negotiate reform of the international monetary system.

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