Back in October, I recommended Sebastian Mallaby's The World's Banker -- an intertwined history of the evolution of development policy and a biography of the Bank's current president, James Wolfensohn -- as an excellent read.

Today, I make the case at greater length in the New York Times Book Review. The closing paragraph sums it up:

Mallaby has done his homework, interviewing hundreds of World Bank officials, critics and government figures -- including Wolfensohn, whom he spoke to for nearly 20 hours. He has produced a book chock-full of affecting vignettes, and that rarest of treats -- an informed disquisition about public policy wrapped up in a fascinating narrative.

For the last time -- I really liked this book. I liked it so much it made it an extremely difficult book to review. Reviewing books one finds fault with is easy -- writing an interesting review that contains only praise is a much more difficult task.

The World's Banker comes out at an interesting time -- Wolfensohn has served as president of the Bank for two terms, and the word on the street is that he's angling for a third term. Will he get it? My sources say no -- this is a plum patronage apointment for Bush (the Bank President is by custom an American, just as the IMF president is by custom a European). I've heard three names bandied about for Wolfensohn's replacement, in decreasing order of likelihood:

1) Colin Powell
2) Robert Zoellick
3) Gary Edson (the G-7 sherpa at the White House).

Developing...

UPDATE: Thanks to P. O'Neill for reminding me that John Harwood had some interesting gossip in Friday's Wall Street Journal:

Officials say Michigan State University President Peter McPherson is a dark-horse contender to head the World Bank. Senate Foreign Relations Chairman [Richard] Lugar, angered by allegations of mismanagement, mulls new oversight proposals including more financial transparency and whistleblower protections.

Here's a link to McPherson's vita, which suggests two things: a) McPherson has the substantive background to do the job; and, b) He's part of the Ford White House mafia -- i.e., Rumsfeld/Cheney.