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A good example of this would be Argentina since it is the most recent failure of World Bank and IMF policy. In the past 10 years the loans received by Argentina came with conditions, which included "removing legal protections that inhibit employers from firing workers; revamping its pension system to generate new savings by cutting back on benefits for retired workers; slash government worker salaries; (and) privatize financial and energy operations of the government."xxviii A civil service downsizing was also found in the conditions of many other countries. Not only did this anger the labour organisations within the country, it caused long strikes that crippled the economy. The Multinational Monitor investigated the policies of the IMF and World Bank, and found striking similarities in 26 other loans. They found that "the institutions' loan conditionalities include a variety of provisions that directly undermine labour fights, labour power and tens of millions of workers' standard of living."xxix How? These conditionalities open the door for transnational corporations (TNC's) to take over previously state-owned operations such as water, energy, and postal services. TNC's are more focused on maximizing their profits than improving workers rights or living conditions, which redistributes the money from the poor to the rich. The IMF and World Bank remove the rights of workers and unions in order to make the market more attractive to the private sector, because "TNCs tend to have a non-union preference."xxx As stated before, the IMF and World Bank have done this in many countries in order to attract TNC's, and they argue that the conditions "may inflict some short-term pain, but are necessary to create the conditions for long-term growth and job creation."xxxi The international community does not agree with this notion and argue that these anti-labour policies cause unnecessary suffering.
There has been even more unnecessary suffering caused by the IMF and the World Bank. In the 1970's, the government of Tanzania, under the guidance of the World Bank, created a program of collective farming. Using the military, the government "drove 13 million peasants (about 90% of the population) from their land, burned their homes, loaded them into trucks and moved them to new sites where they were ordered to build new homes."xxxii This is a gross violation of human rights. Moving people and burning their homes is inhuman treatment. Worst of all it did not help the country at all, instead it created a drop in food production. This did not stop the IMF and World Bank from doing it again, for only a few years later and over a period of ten years, they helped Indonesia forcefully resettle over 6 million people, not only creating environmental problems but massive displacement and starvation. When this program was extended to 1998, there was great resistance found in East Timor, which was met with brutal repression by the government, and this "led to the death of an estimated 150,000 Timorese at the hands of the military."xxxiii
The human rights continues to worsen in Indonesia, but in 1998 a $43 billion package was put together, and in return Indonesia promised to "make its trade practices fairer and its markets more open"xxxiv, and the IMF continues to ignore the more important issue of human rights improvements, instead favouring economic policy.
Conclusion
The IMF and the World Bank are two very powerful and influential institutions that distribute billions of dollars each year to countries in need. They have the ability to persuade governments to make radical reforms their economies, and even resettle millions of people at a time. Unfortunately, the IMF and the World Bank fail miserably to improve the human rights in the countries they are trying to assist. While some of their actions do bring economic stability to regions, the costs cast upon the citizens if the nations are not always worth it. The continued funding of military regimes and repressive governments does not help the credibility of the institutions, and they must begin to improve human rights through their assistance packages. Of the two, the IMF will be the most difficult to reform because of their refusal to include human rights in the conditions they force upon governments, even though it has been found that they should be considering human rights when making their conditions.
Endnotes
i The IMF and the World Bank: How do they differ? IMF External Relations Department, 1987
ii Brodnig, Gernot, The World Bank and Human Rights: Mission Impossible, 2001
iii For a number of documents and other resources on the CDF, see the Bank's website at
http://www.worldbank.org/cdf .
iv For a number of documents and other resources on the CDF, see the Bank's website at
http://www.worldbank.org/cdf .
v Capdevila, Gustavo, IMF Not Taking into Account Human Rights Issues, 2001,
vi Capdevila, Gustavo, IMF Not Taking into Account Human Rights Issues, 2001,
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Comments
Tadoh | Mar 26th, 2004
Besides having posted some pages more than once, I must say that we are looking at financial lending institutions as a matter of fact. Now, they're mission may appear in the interest of eliminating poverty and supporting development, however that can only go so far when you consider how the lending game works. They need someone to live off of and they actually made the brightest move to only work with countries as their customers/ clients. It hardly gets any bigger than that.
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