The major wire services, the New York Times, the Guardian, etc. etc. all agree: President Bush will today (May 30) nominate Robert Zoellick to be the next president of the World Bank. He would apparently be serving a full 5-year term, not just completing the 3 years left on the term of the disgraced Paul Wolfowitz.

This means 7 years of George W. Bush appointees at the head of the World Bank: the overlooked pitfall to getting rid of Wolfowitz.

And indeed Zoellick is more of the same. He is from the same "neo-conservative" grouping of foreign policy advocates who brought us the Iraq war. Wolfowitz was leader of that pack, but Zoellick was right there along with him, back to signing the now notorious 1998 letter to then-President Clinton in which the "Project for a New American Century" (how's that for an aspiration for the next head of the WB?) advocating proactive action against Saddam Hussein.

The press is treating this as the de facto coronation of the president of the World Bank. And traditionally that is what it has always been: the U.S. President picks someone, and the board gives its rubber-stamp approval. This follows the "unwritten agreement" formulated at the time of the World Bank's founding, back in 1944. Under the agreement, Western Europe gets the right to name the head of the IMF. Everyone else is locked out, and merit gets no consideration.

That's how we ended up with Wolfowitz. And despite the dismay that greeted Bush's insulting choice of the Iraq war architect, the drawn-out battle to get rid of Wolfowitz, and the unending series of revelations about his arrogant mismanagement, all signs point to the European countries -- the only counterbalance to the U.S.'s power at the board of the World Bank -- going along with the old custom, asking no questions about whoever Bush wants to choose.

Of course it was probably not possible for him to find someone who would make a more outrageous choice than Wolfowitz. But that should be no occasion for feelings of relief at the naming of Zoellick. He's a believer in U.S. domination, and, in his most visible post as U.S. Trade Representative (2000-2004), a hardline negotiator who let no thoughts of "development" interfere with his quest to preserve the profit privileges of the U.S. during the negotiations of the so-called "Doha development round" at the World Trade Organization. His performance in Cancun, at the WTO's 2003 summit, and especially afterward, when he toured Latin America attacking all the governments that had dared to stand up to the U.S. to prevent a very one-sided deal from going through, was stunning.

This is not someone who has made many friends in the developing world. This is someone who has asserted U.S. prerogatives at every turn, has not shied away from insulting his counterparts, and who has had no visible qualms about tasks such as telling the West African countries no, the U.S. will not give up its subsidies to multimillionaire cotton barons -- subsidies that amount to more than some of their countries' GDP, if I recall correctly -- just so that some African farmers might have something to eat.

Putting Zoellick at the head of the World Bank would be fitting in light of the positioning of Pascal Lamy at the head of the WTO a couple years ago. In his previous job, Lamy was Zoellick's counterpart for the EU. The two of them combined to prevent "development" from infecting the Doha round, and fighting the attempts of the developing countries to resist being bullied into another bad deal. Those are the credentials that get you the top jobs in today's global economic system. Supachai, who was then heading the WTO, got rewarded with a lesser title in the same club -- head of UNCTAD, often viewed as the "progressive" voice to counter the WB etc. -- where he can continue the task of diluting the voice of that institution. It gets harder and harder to rebut the accusation that the international institutions exist to protect and expand rich country domination.

Not all hope is lost just yet. A few countries -- Brazil, China, South Africa, and, surprisingly, Australia -- have called for an open merit-based process of picking the World Bank President. They are unlikely to succeed, given the weighted voting strength at the WB. But they should be encouraged to make a stand, to at least point to the corruption of the process. The WB's board, apparently in response to criticism of the U.S. domination of the process, issued a statement yesterday saying that any board member can nominate anyone for the presidency, and that they anticipate going through a full process, with a result expected by the end of June.

That's a good opening. The process should be slowed down, so that Zoellick's full resume can come out, and objections to this blatantly undemocratic process can gather momentum.