“If you have the wealth, you have to share it,” was the slogan of former World Bank President James Wolfensohn, a larger than life, selfish, extremely confident, die-hard networker, but basically a good man. and spiritually. Wolfensohn, who died at the age of 86, earned a lot of money and gave a lot.
The high point of his career were his two terms as President of the World Bank between 1995 and 2005, during which his enthusiasm and passion for the fight against poverty left an indelible mark. Not afraid to face the reality of too many World Bank loans ending up in beneficiaries’ anonymous offshore bank accounts, he set up an anti-corruption task force that was previously unthinkable. his arrival for fear of legitimizing the bank’s criticism and possibly denigrating innocent people. Borrower.
He went ahead, however, while reconfiguring the bank’s loan program to see a different reality: too many less developed countries were simply too poor to repay what they had borrowed – and owed their loans. canceled. Harbingering today’s concerns, he expanded the bank’s lending programs from solely supporting the physical infrastructure of dams, power generation, and ports to women’s social education infrastructure.
To consolidate this new direction, the Comprehensive Development Framework was introduced to provide recipient countries with comprehensive parameters for assessing their economic and social progress. This approach takes into account educational and health standards as well as per capita income growth.
His presidency of the bank was a defining moment. Education, public health and women’s empowerment have been and are as important to economic development as electricity, railways and roads.
Wolfensohn was always on the move – when in Washington walked “on the floor” of bank offices teasing and joking, or just as likely on a plane, his beloved cello would often sit next to him and visit bank customers. World – he has visited a total of 120 countries – where he would infallibly call a spade a spade, embarrassing as the remark was. “What is the difference between God and James Wolfensohn?” played a joke in Washington. “God is everywhere – Wolfensohn too, but never here!”
He said his passion for fighting inequality, reducing poverty and donating money as a philanthropist had its roots in his humble upbringing in a two-bedroom apartment in suburban Sydney – which brought him to life. perhaps also in view of the ambition to drive all your life.
His parents, Hyman Wolfensohn and Dora Weinbaum, emigrated to Australia in 1928 after his father’s banking career at Rothschild was stifled, never to leave despite being in love with the Rothschilds. He was smart and very ambitious: at school he sang the roles of young women in the operas of Gilbert and Sullivan to attract attention, and as an outdoor sportsman he represented Australia at the 1956 Olympics as a valued member of the fencing team .
He would say that the fact that his Jewish parents were accepted as refugees from Nazi Germany despite their relative poverty inflamed him with a lifelong compassion for the dispossessed – and being an Olympian gave him inner confidence at home. Height of his ambition. He was really good enough to climb the heights.
After graduating from the University of Sydney, he turned to Harvard Business School, conceding that an MBA from Harvard would be a passport to the City of London that a law degree in Sydney alone would not provide. So it turned out. After a few false starts, he got a job at the fast-growing boutique and commercial bank Darling and Co.
At Harvard, he also met Elaine Botwinick. They married in 1961 and had three children.
Darling and Co. proved to be a stepping stone for Schroders, where his kindness and cold eye for what was and what wasn’t good business earned him a growing list of customers. In 1970 he was destined for higher things when he could take the opportunity to expand Schroders’ business to New York, where he achieved spectacular results thanks to a contact book and his love. Entertainment that is already becoming something of a legend.
But in 1976 Schroders was unwilling to offer the manager of his New York business the top post in the bank, and preferred the British aristocrat Lord Airlie Wolfensohn.
When he read the runes, he went to Salomon Brothers and rose to the top to confirm his dazzling impact on investment banking on Wall Street. It was Chrysler’s rescheduling in 1979 that saved the automaker from bankruptcy and, in particular, convinced Japanese banks to keep lending that drew the double gaze of the titans of Wall Street and the democratic establishment.
He was a man who could marry high finances, good values and high politics, and finish alchemy constructively. He was asked to become President of the World Bank – but Republicans won the presidency, and although he took US citizenship to secure his chances (only Americans are nominated for the presidency of the World Bank), the opportunity was missed.
He reinvented himself once again, but as the founder of his own investment firm Wolfensohn Inc., he would amass his fortune over the next 14 years and double as a great new philanthropist. York and Washington. He directed Carnegie Hall in New York and the Kennedy Center of the Performing Arts in Washington.
In a typical combination of self-aggrandizement, genuine affection for music and generosity towards Jacqueline de Pré, who was struggling with multiple sclerosis and wanted to renew her life, he took lessons from her on the cello. They were given on the condition that he perform publicly, which he did on his 50th, 60th and 70th birthday.
Bill Clinton’s presidency – they were inevitably friends – was supposed to give him the chance he dreamed of at the World Bank, and in 1995 he took over the presidency. With honors from the UK, USA, Germany and his native Australia, he was happily retired in 2005, which combined philanthropy and counseling and gave up the role of envoy for peace in the Middle-Orient after 11 months because he said he couldn’t do anything useful.
Elaine died in August. He is survived by a son and two daughters.
• James David Wolfensohn, banker, born December 1, 1933; died on November 25, 2020
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