| Stephany Griffith-Jones | |
| School Tradition: | New Keynesian economics |
| Birth Date: | June 5, 1947 |
| Institution: | Initiative for Policy Dialogue Overseas Development Institute |
| Field: | Financial economics Development economics |
| Education: | University of Chile (BA) Cambridge University (PhD) |
| Influences: | John Maynard Keynes Hyman Minsky James Tobin Charles P. Kindleberger John Kenneth Galbraith Joseph Stiglitz |
| Awards: | Distinguished Czech Woman of the World Award (2006) ALIDE prize for best essay on Latin America's international finance (1983) |
| Spouse: | Robert Griffith-Jones |
Stephany Griffith-Jones (born Stepanka Novy Kafka[1] in 5 June 1947) is an economist specializing in international finance and development. Her expertise lies in the reform of the international financial system, particularly in financial regulation, global governance, and international capital flows. Currently, she serves as a member of the Governor Board at the Central Bank of Chile. She has held various positions throughout her career, including financial markets director at the Initiative for Policy Dialogue based at Columbia University,[2] associate fellow at the Overseas Development Institute, and professorial fellow at the Institute of Development Studies at Sussex University.
Griffith-Jones has an extensive background in international organizations, having worked as deputy director of International Finance at the Commonwealth Secretariat, and for the United Nations Department of Economic and Social Affairs and the United Nations Economic Commission for Latin America and the Caribbean. Her career began in 1970 at the Central Bank of Chile, and she also gained experience at Barclays Bank International in the UK before joining the Institute of Development Studies. She has served as a senior consultant to governments in Eastern Europe and Latin America, as well as to international agencies such as the World Bank, the Inter-American Development Bank, the European Commission, UNICEF, UNDP, and the United Nations Conference on Trade and Development. Griffith-Jones was a member of the Warwick Commission on international financial reform.[3]
As an author, Griffith-Jones has published over 20 books and has written numerous scholarly and journalistic articles. One of her notable works is the book Time for the Visible Hand: Lessons from the 2008 Crisis, which she co-edited with José Antonio Ocampo and Joseph Stiglitz, published in 2010.
Griffith-Jones was born in Prague and moved to Chile at the age of one. She received her primary and secondary education in Chile and graduated from the University of Chile. Notably, she is the niece of Franz Kafka. She adopted her current surname after marrying British mathematician Robert Griffith-Jones. Additionally, she served as an economic advisor to Chilean president Gabriel Boric during his presidential campaign.
Griffith-Jones has contributed to research and policy suggestions on how to make the domestic and international financial system more stable so it can better serve the needs of inclusive economic development and the real economy. One of her first articles, The Growth of Multinational Banking, the Euro-currency market and their effects on developing countries[4] in the Journal of Development Studies, published in 1980, warned of the risk of excessive international bank lending to developing economies.
Her 1986 book with Osvaldo Sunkel, Debt and Development Crises in Latin America: The End of An Illusion, showed the negative effects of the 1980s Latin American debt crisis on the region's economic development.[5] She was an early advocate of debt relief in Latin America and Sub-saharan Africa.
Writing with Ricardo Ffrench-Davis in the 1990s she contributed to the debate on how Latin America could curb and manage volatile capital flows.[6] She again warned of the risks of costly financial crises if sufficient measures such as capital controls were not implemented.
After several financial crises, mainly in developing countries, she started in the mid-1990s to advocate capital flow regulations in capital source countries as a way to curb excessive and volatile capital flows.[7] She believed this would reduce the risk of major reversals of capital flows and the financial crises that result from them. This is further discussed in her 1998 book Global Capital Flows, should they be regulated?[8]
In the discussion on reform of the international financial architecture she contributed to the analysis of crisis prevention, especially through financial regulation and more effective financial crisis management. For example, she advocated special drawing rights issues by the International Monetary Fund (IMF) as a means to provide official liquidity when private capital flows fall sharply. She also advocated expanded and less conditional IMF lending so countries do not have to unnecessarily adjust their economies, especially in the face of financial crises or other external shocks.
Writing with José Antonio Ocampo since the late 1990s[9] they expanded the concept of counter-cyclical reform of the international financial system to help stabilise capital flows and domestic private lending. The aim was to avoid frequent costly crises, facilitate macro-economic management and to achieve stable and inclusive economic growth in developing countries.
She has worked on practical policy applications of these ideas. She has advocated reform of compensatory financing at the IMF in the face of external shocks to make it larger, speedier and with less conditionality. Similarly she was an early supporter of expanding development banks - nationally, regionally and multilaterally - and their role in counter-cyclical lending. She has also advocated the issue of GDP-linked bonds as a counter-cyclical mechanism to reduce the risk of financial crises.[10] She has long supported the idea of counter-cyclical regulation. These and other practical measures are aimed at reforming the financial system so that it supports stable inclusive economic growth without costly financial crises.