Mentions International Monetary Fund (IMF)

By following the IMF’s prescriptions, often at significant cost to national development goals, one would at least expect countries to have stabilised and avoided debt crisis. But 54 countries are now in a debt crisis and many are spending more on servicing their debt than on financing education or health.

The IMF has actively failed to prevent the present debt crisis which is today more severe than it was in the late 1990s and early 2000s.

Indeed, this hints at a basic problem. Debt is the source of power for the IMF. It is debt that forces countries to come to the IMF as the lender of last resort. It is debt that forces countries to accept the IMF’s harsh loan conditions and coercive advice on austerity, undermining their own development goals. Without debt, the IMF would be powerless!