U.N. Revisits The International Tax Architecture

U.N. Secretary-General António Guterres is expected to release a much-anticipated report on international tax cooperation within a few weeks. As the international tax community waits — and speculates — on what that report might say, the secretary-general recently offered a small hint.

At the end of May he released a report calling for a new international financial architecture underpinned by sustainable development goals. That report, “Our Common Agenda Policy Brief 6: Reforms to the International Financial Architecture,” argues that the international financial architecture is in a decisively weak moment: “The international financial architecture, crafted in 1945 after the Second World War, is undergoing a stress test of historic proportions — and it is failing the test.”