Woman vs economist, or European vs Mexican?

When you are bidding for one of the most coveted posts in the world, be prepared to be judged on various seemingly unimportant variables, besides your intellectual abilities. Among many, these may include your weight, age and gender, and contenders for the position of the IMF chief will testify to that.
Between a silver-haired, French woman and a rather robust Mexican economist came a former World Bank chief economist as a surprise candidate for a short stint, only to be siphoned out by the IMF late last Monday.
When Fischer Stanley had entered the race for the coveted post, his exemplary credentials were pointed out by many. The Bank of Israel governor had a lot to his credit - experience with emerging markets, being well-connected with heads of central banks and being deputy International Monetary Fund Managing Director from 1994 to 2001.
Though the IMF rejected his candidacy on grounds that he was late submitting his nomination; Fisher suspects that his age might have been the real dissuader. Fischer, 67, is past the age limit of 65 for candidates for Managing Director. Besides, his Israeli citizenship might not have struck a chord with Arab nations.
This means one candidate down for the two shortlisted contestants; Christine Lagarde - the French finance minister - and Agustin Carstens - the chief of the Mexican central bank.
For Lagarde, her strong political skills, and backing from the EU countries, Indonesia, Egypt and UAE are points favouring her so far. Her gender, however, remains a tricky aspect of her candidacy since all the global progress has not much altered hesitations around the idea of having a woman on top - after all, how many female US presidents, IMF chiefs, and World Bank heads do we know of?
Yet, as Lucy Kellaway of the Financial Times was quoted by the BBC, "Such is the public desire to see women succeed, that a powerful woman with talent, connections and ambition, has probably had an easier time of climbing the ladder than her male counterparts."
And Lagarde has been touting womanhood as one of her plusses to help her in her prospective job of heading the IMF.
But she still doesn have the backing of the crucial emerging economies such as India and China. Support of the BRIC economies - Brazil, Russia, India and China - is very consequential this time around when the emerging countries are questioning the tradition of having a European heading the IMF ever since the institution was created.
And in comes Carstens advocating he "offered a far deeper understanding than the French finance minister of the difficulties that emerging markets faced", according to the Financial Times.
He is also believed to be more suited for the job in terms of his experience as a central banker, chief economist, and as a former deputy managing director of the Fund, besides being a finance minister previously. And hes also won support from Latin American countries, though not yet from Brazil, Argentina and Chile.
But, besides some inane comments on his corpulence having the potential to affect his efficiency as a prospective IMF chief, Carstens is from the North American continent, and having North Americans preside over two key global institutions - the World Bank and the IMF - may count against him.
Besides, political acumen may not be his best feat, as in the case of his opponent, and unfortunately, it is not a very fair world.
If experience and technical soundness might have been the sole criterion for deciding who runs the IMF, perhaps Carstens may have had the odds in his favour. But with the likelihood of Lagarde potentially gaining US support, and the fact that such battles are not contested on merit alone, the ball seems more tilted towards the fairer court.