Christopher Kilby’s research while affiliated with Villanova University and other places

Does the US administration exercise more informal influence over the World Bank when it has less control over US bilateral aid because of opposition from Congress? Replicating four studies of the World Bank, we show that years with a divided US government account for earlier findings of informal influence. This link between donor domestic politics and the exercise of influence in multilateral settings is important for understanding informality in international organizations and provides an alternate explanation to persistent questions about the role of international organizations in the international political economy.

Do the normal rules of the game apply in international organizations during a global pandemic? We explore this question by comparing regular and COVID-19 World Bank loans. Analyzing lending from April 2, 2020 (the start of COVID-19 lending) to December 31, 2020, we find different results for the two types of World Bank loans. Looking at regular loans, countries that vote more in line with the U.S. on UN General Assembly resolutions are more likely to receive loans. For COVID-19 loans, geopolitics is not a significant factor. In contrast to ordinary business, the World Bank appears to have kept politics out of its pandemic response, instead more effectively focusing on provision of an important international public good.

Starting even before its founding in 2015, the Asian Infrastructure Investment Bank (AIIB) has attracted controversy. Critics—especially the U.S. administration—claim the bank is an instrument of China intended to advance narrow Chinese interests and thereby undermine U.S. influence globally. But does AIIB lending show any Chinese influence? Analysis on AIIB lending patterns has been scant. Based on AIIB loan data through the end of 2019, our analysis suggests the AIIB is facilitating “remedial multilateralism” for China, whereby countries economically distant from China have privileged access to AIIB loans. This is contrary to expectations from “supplementary multilateralism,” whereby the multilateral setting reinforces existing bilateral ties. The paper advances the notions of supplementary and remedial multilateralism and provides a comprehensive analysis of AIIB loans in the first four years of the institution’s operation. It, thus, contributes to the understanding of how China’s rise is affecting the landscape of multilateral development finance.

Do U.S. presidential administrations exert more informal influence over international financial institutions when they face an uncooperative Congress and thus have less control over bilateral aid? Reexamining four empirical studies of the World Bank, we demonstrate that U.S. informal influence is driven by years with divided U.S. government. This provides a richer picture of when and why the U.S. exerts influence in multilateral settings and an alternate explanation to persistent questions about the role of international organizations in the international political economy.

World Bank projects sometimes receive supplemental loans months or years after initial project approval. Largely unnoticed, supplemental lending has mushroomed in the last decade, accounting for nearly 30% of all new loans in some years. These loans can serve important functions, as they come without the bureaucratic delays associated with new projects. We argue that supplemental loans are potentially useful foreign policy tools for powerful donors in settings where time is of the essence. Consistent with this, we find that countries receive significantly larger supplemental loans while serving a two‐year term on the geopolitically important United Nations Security Council. L'essor des prêts supplémentaires au sein de la Banque mondiale. Les projets de la Banque mondiale peuvent parfois bénéficier de prêts supplémentaires plusieurs mois ou années après leur validation initiale. Passant très souvent inaperçus, ces prêts supplémentaires ont proliféré au cours des dernières décennies, représentant certaines années près de 30 % de tous les nouveaux prêts accordés. Échappant aux délais bureaucratiques afférents aux nouveaux projets, ces prêts peuvent revêtir d'importantes fonctions. Nous affirmons que les prêts supplémentaires représentent d'utiles outils de politique étrangère pour les puissants donateurs dans les situations où le temps constitue un élément crucial. Dans cette optique, nous constatons que les pays reçoivent des prêts supplémentaires bien plus importants lorsqu'ils siègent pour deux ans au Conseil de sécurité des Nations Unies, organe éminemment important au plan géopolitique.

In 2011, the World Bank’s Independent Evaluation Group made its project ratings database public. With broad geographic and sectoral coverage, this database is a valuable resource for research on development effectiveness, what works and what does not. This chapter first provides an overview for scholars interested in evaluation but unfamiliar with the World Bank evaluation system. Next we examine whether geopolitical or institutional factors influence ratings. We focus on how projects are selected for performance assessments and what factors influence project ratings. We find evidence that bureaucratic factors influence selection and that one geopolitical variable—nonpermanent United Nations Security Council membership—impacts ratings. Nonetheless if researchers control for potential biases, World Bank project ratings can provide a valuable way to measure project quality in many applications.