| In 1982 numerous Third World countries threatened to default on their debts. This produced a crisis which promised to undermine the world financial system. It was the greatest period of international financial stress the world had seen since the Great Depression, and there was an international mobilization to forestall global financial collapse. How these actors coordinated the "rescue" of the international system, and who managed the dynamics of stress adjustment, is the subject of this dissertation.; In order to treat the nuances of this problem in international political-economy, I use regime analysis as my theoretical framework. This directs the critic to examine the rules, norms and decisionmaking procedures as systemic constraints, as well as the function of sanctions, incentives and accommodation. It also examines the level of complex interdependence among actors.; I have chosen the largest Latin American debtors for my case studies--Argentina, Brazil and Mexico--because they have presented the clearest threat to the system and the greatest variance in their responses to international pressure. The other actors that I focus on are the International Monetary Fund, government agencies of the industrialized countries, and the commercial banks.; My findings indicate that the system of international finance as it existed in the 1970s was anarchic, and that in 1982 the regime was ill-equipped to accommodate the sudden stress presented to it by massive global default. In the last five years, adjustment coordination has involved a dynamic among all actors. Further, it is apparent that this dynamic evolves around the commercial bank steering committees, not the IMF or official lenders as some have suggested. I also find that adjustment has been short-term, and that no mechanism exists to coordinate this highly volatile system with rational long-term objectives. Finally, in response to the precepts of complex interdependence, the case studies demonstrate that the options open to each actor leave the commercial banks in the most powerful position and the debtors in the weakest. |
