Kazakh President Nursultan Nazarbaev is neither shy about his vision of turning Kazakhstan into one of the world’s 50 most competitive countries, nor reserved in his ambitions ranging from the integration of Central Asia to the recent call for a single global currency to deal with the financial crisis. As the leaders of the G-20 countries prepare for a financial summit on April 2 in London, Nazarbaev has been advancing his proposal to deal with the global recession, and with it, his domestic and international clout.

“We must switch to a new global currency system, which will be based on a single global monetary unit,”- Nazarbayev underlined on March 10 at the congress of the Eurasian Universities Association, adding that Kazakhstan presented to the world with view of the solution. Claiming that a dollar currency is an undemocratic and unregulated world currency, the president proposes the creation of a single global currency under the UN auspices. Previously on his trip to India, Nazarbaev stated that “the future measures should ensure that we have a completely just global currency, and not with only one issuer as is the case today.” According to him, "the existing global financial monetary system does not meet current requirements and does not correspond to any criteria of a stable monetary system...”

The IMF reacted by saying the idea was “interesting, but poorly explored” as of now. Nobel Prize winner and economist Edmund Phelps partially supported the project, arguing that “there is no sense in having more than 90 currencies in the world,” while disagreeing that a single global currency alone will solve the problem. Another Nobel Prize winner, and the architect of the Euro currency, Robert Mundell, however, explicitly sided with the initiative: “…I agree with President Nazarbayev on his statement and many of the things he said in his plan...” Kazakhstan’s proposal for what Nazarbaev terms “acmetal” global currency might “look kind of funny” but in reality is a step in the right direction. The “acmetal” is a combination of two words: acme, the Greek word for “best,” and “capital.” Modern capitalism represents what Nazarbaev calls “defectalism.” Hence the need for a new financial-monetary system of “acmetalizm”, built on a more perfect capital. 

Kazakhstan is not alone in proposing reforms of the financial order left over after a blow to the Bretton Woods system in 1971. German Chancellor Angela Merkel proposed the creation of a UN economic council that would work out anti-crisis solutions, while British Prime Minister Gordon Brown and U.S. Secretary of the Treasury Timothy Geithner called for a centrally coordinated financial system. Ewald Nowotny, the European Central Bank member, stressed that a “tri-polar” currency system is already developing among the US, Europe, and Asia to replace the U.S. dollar-based financial order. French President Nicolas Sarkozy, in his turn, stated that “the dollar cannot claim to be the only currency in the world,” arguing that “in the capitalism of the 21st century, there is room for the state.” Canadian Finance Minister Jim Flaherty, however, was cautious about the need to reengineer the volatile financial system: “We don't need to recreate the world right now. What people expect of us, quite frankly, in our countries is to get our own houses in order.'' Russian President Dmitri Medvedev, stressing the dangers of depending on a single uncontrolled global currency, has lobbied for a number of regional reserve currencies, including the Russian ruble. Sergei Perminov with the Rye, Man & Gor Securities brokerage firm in Russia, however, is pessimistic on the issue: "This is all in the realm of fantasy. Alternatives to the dollar are still hard to find."

In his “Keys to Crisis Resolution” article, Nazarbaev actually agreed to the idea of a single central bank, albeit without the Russian ruble being the regional legal tender. Deputy Chairman of “Ak Zhol” party Burihan Nurmuhamedov considers Nazarbaev’s proposals, including the one for a regional currency voiced at the Economic Forum on March 11, as a way to avert Russia’s plans to create Ruble-based regional currency within the EEC while welcoming a single regional currency along non-Russian lines.

Many, however, have voiced objections to the proposals requiring international centralization of the financial system, putting forward national sovereignty considerations and conspiracy-like propositions. “The control of money and credit strikes at the very heart of national sovereignty,” said A. Clausen, president of Bank of America.

The character of the many proposals is indeed controversial. Nazarbaev’s idea of a global currency, while shared by distinguished policy-makers and experts, may backfire at the upcoming financial summit. The complexity of the international system, functioning of different economies, time constrains and difficulties of common policy coordination, will stand in the way of Nazarbaev’s vision, providing less ambitious projects with more chances of being implemented, at least in the immediate future.