Bretton Woods : Fifty years later The paper looks into the policies developed at the global level which are according to the author, conceived with a view to managing the crisis, not moving out of it. The target of these policies is to generate financial opportunities for excess capital which, growingly, cannot find an outlet in investment in the expansion of the productive system. These policies, formulated by IMF, the World Bank and the WTO (following GATT) complete, at global level, strategies developed at national levels which are also basically conceived within the same rational levels which are also basically conceived within the same rational levels which are also basically conceived within the same rationale of crisis management. Flexible rates of exchange, along with deregulation of international movements of capital, provide opportunities for speculative short term investment which are far more important than the flows associated with international trade and foreign investment in production. High rates of interest are therefore insurance prices to pay for those high risks in speculative investments. Foreign debts, the deficit of the balance of payments of the US, privatization offer, in those circumstances, major outlets for financial investments. This financialisation of the global system aggravates inequalities in the distribution of income nationally and internationally, as well as the flow of capital from South to North, East to West. It generates a deflationary spiral, pulling away from moving out of the crisis.