Dean Reardon-Anderson, students and faculty: Thank you for welcoming me here today!

I am honored to be hosted by one of the world’s finest schools of foreign service. Your mission statement is “to contribute to global peace, prosperity and human wellbeing by educating future generations of world leaders.”

The founders of your school had an ambitious and sustainable vision back in 1789; but they did not know that 70 years ago the IMF would be founded to pursue the same objectives – albeit by different means. I could not be at a better place than speaking here today.

As I look at the grey and blue colors of Georgetown that adorn this beautiful campus, I am reminded of the themes that I will touch upon today: some “grey” clouds hovering over the global economy; and the “blue” skies of growth and prosperity to which we both aspire.

This will be the topic for the Finance Ministers and Central Bank Governors of our 188 member countries as they arrive in Washington next week for the Annual Meetings of the IMF and World Bank. They will also be discussing, of course, the role of the IMF.

Let me say a few words about the IMF and its task.

Founded in the aftermath of World War II, the Fund has helped the world to fight many economic crises – from Europe, to Asia, to Latin America, to the former Soviet Union, and back to Europe. We have helped emerging markets and the world’s poorest nations to integrate into the global economy. Across our entire membership, we have helped to build economic and financial capacity.

In recent years, we have provided assistance during the global financial crisis – the worst facing the world since the Great Depression. In recent months, we have provided support to Ukraine, nations in the Middle East, and the Ebola-stricken countries of West Africa.

Our main job now is to help the global economy shift gears and overcome what has been so far a disappointing recovery: one that is brittle, uneven, and beset by risks.

This will be foremost on policymakers’ minds next week. Indeed, in many ways, the global economy is at an inflection point.

Yes, there is a recovery but as we all know – and can all feel it – the level of growth and jobs is simply not good enough. The world needs to aim higher and try harder, to do it together and be country-specific.

What does that mean? It means a mix of bolder policies to inject a “new momentum” that can overcome this “new mediocre” that clouds the future. That is what I want to discuss with you today.

As one of the most illustrious faculty members of this School and former Secretary of State Madeleine Albright once said: “The best speech will do it all – make us laugh, think, cry, and cheer – preferably in that order!” Today I would mainly like to make you think – and hopefully not make you cry too much!

I will focus on two topics:

(i) First, the state of the global economy – and the risk that the world could get stuck for some time with a “mediocre” level of growth; and

(ii) Second, how all policymakers can generate the policy “momentum” needed to power up global activity, and avoid the new mediocre.

I will conclude with what I see as priorities for a new “multilateralism” – how to galvanize global cooperation and the role of the IMF.

So three M’s”: mediocre growth, momentum on policies, and multilateralism for action.

1. State of the Global Economy – A New Mediocre?

First, a quick health check on the global economy. We will be releasing our updated forecasts next week, so today I will touch only upon the broad trends.

Overall, the global economy is weaker than we had envisaged even six months ago. Only a modest pickup is foreseen for 2015, as the outlook for potential growth has been pared down.

Prospects differ, of course, across countries and regions. In fact, this is one of the most striking characteristics of the current economic conjuncture: it is very country-specific.

Among advanced economies, the rebound is expected to be strongest in the United States and the United Kingdom; modest in Japan; and weakest in the Euro Area, within which there are disparities.

Emerging market and developing economies have been doing much of the heavy lifting during this crisis – accounting for more than 80 percent of world growth since 2008. Led by Asia, and China in particular, we expect that they will continue to help drive global activity. For them too, however, it is likely to be at a slower pace than before.

For the low-income developing countries, including Sub-Saharan Africa, economic prospects are rising – with growth projected broadly to accelerate beyond the 6 percent recorded last year. But as debt builds up in some countries, they need to be watching as well.

Finally, in the Middle East, the outlook is clouded by difficult economic transitions and by intense social and political strife.

The bottom line? Six years after the financial crisis began, we see continued weakness in the global economy. Countries are still dealing with the legacies of the crisis, including high debt burdens and unemployment. In addition, there are some serious clouds on the horizon:

Low growth for a long time is one. What do I mean? If people expect growth potential to be lower tomorrow, they will cut back on investment and consumption today. This dynamic could seriously impede the recovery, especially in advanced economies that are also grappling with high unemployment and low inflation. This is the case for the Euro Area.

There is also a cloud hovering around asynchronous monetary policy normalization in advanced economies and its potential spillovers to other countries around the world – and back – both through their impact on interest rates and exchange rate variations.

As well as these “economic” clouds, there are financial ones. There is concern that financial sector excesses may be building up, especially in advanced economies. Asset valuations are at an all time high; spreads and volatility are at an all time low.

A further worry is the migration of new market and liquidity risks to the “shadows” of the financial world. This is part of the less-regulated, nonbank sector, which is growing rapidly in some countries. In the United States, for example, shadow banking is now considerably larger than the traditional banking system; in Europe, it is roughly half the size; and in China, at 25-35 percent, it is the fifth largest shadow banking sector in the world.

Of course, nonbank activities can complement the banking sector in financing the economy in important ways. Yet, the opaqueness of these activities warrants heightened vigilance. They also warrant increased efforts to complete the agenda of financial sector reform, including resolving the too-important-to-fail problem, setting an appropriate perimeter for the monitoring of shadow banks, and making the derivatives markets safer and more transparent.

As well as economic and financial “clouds”, there are geopolitical risks. They include:

A possible further escalation of the situation in Ukraine, which could provoke disruptions in commodity prices, financial markets and trade;

Political developments in the Middle East and in some parts of Asia;

And an expansion of the Ebola outbreak in Africa, which could pose a significant risk to the region and indeed the world, if not urgently and appropriately addressed.

All of these risks, of course, also involve immense human suffering and we hope that they do not develop. But we would be remiss simply to ignore them.