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The I.M.F. in Africa: Unnecessary and Undesirable Western Restraints on Development

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  11 November 2008

Extract

The International Monetary Fund has established itself as the most important economic actor among the many international agencies of our day. Indeed, the most powerful market-economy governments and banks now look to it for leadership in assessing and resolving the key difficulties of world finance. But the I.M.F. has yet to resolve the major problem that it faces as an institution and that its most influential members refuse to recognise as they try to fashion a world economic order: dominated politically, legally, and institutionally by the market élite, the Fund has yet to make the cultural and political leap necessary to understand and work with, rather than against, the majority of its members who are in the Third World. Until the I.M.F. does so, it will continue to be harshly criticised and distrusted by the less-developed countries (L.D.C.s), and it will never achieve either its economic and political potential as a major international agency, or its supposed goal of ordered world economic prosperity.

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Copyright © Cambridge University Press 1987

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References

Page 404 note 1 Spio-Garbach, Ekwow, ‘A Strategy for Africa's Financial Management’, in Africa Report (New Brunswick), 29, 5, 09-10 1984, p. 76. I have updated the number of adjustment programmes reported in this article as a result of information received from the I.M.F.'s African DepartmentGoogle Scholar. For the I.M.F. and the Paris Club, see Aronson, Jonathan David, Money and Power: banks and the world monetary system (Beverly Hills, 1977), pp. 167–8. Lowconditionality loans place fewer and less particular burdens on the requesting government, thereby giving it more freedom to determine its economic policies.Google Scholar

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Page 404 note 3 Brett, E. A., in Bureau, Latin America (ed.), The Poverty Brokers: the IMF and Latin America (London, 1983), p. 26.Google Scholar

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Page 405 note 1 In 1979, for example, Spain represented Costa Rica, El Salvador, Guatemala, Honduras, Mexico, Nicaragua, and Venezuela, though the latter had a larger quota than Spain.

Page 405 note 2 Brett, loc. cit. pp. 26–8.

Page 405 note 3 Abdala, Ismail-Sabri, ‘The Inadequacy and Loss of Légitimacy of the International Monetary Fund’ in Development Dialogue (Uppsala), 2, 1980, p. 37.Google Scholar

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Page 406 note 2 ‘The Terra Nova Statement on the International Monetary System and the Third World’, in Development Dialogue, 1, 1980, p. 30. See also the Report of the Director-General for Development and International Economic Cooperation, ‘Towards the New International Economic Order’, New York, United Nations, 1982, p. 18; and Parkinson, F., ‘The IMF in Economic Development: equality and discrimination’, in Journal of African Law (London), 26, I, Spring 1982, p. 22.Google Scholar

Page 406 note 3 ‘Background Notes on the International Monetary Fund’ in Development Dialogue, 2, 1980, p. 103. The monthly meeting of the Bank for International Settlements in Basel, Switzerland, provides an opportunity for the central bank governors of the Group of Ten to maintain regular contacts.

Page 406 note 4 Cohen, Benjamin J., Organizing the World's Money: the political economy of international monetary relations (New York, 1977), p. 151. S.D.R.s were created in 07 1969 as a form of international reserve asset to replace the dollar as the Fund's official unit of account. They are allocated to members as a supplement to other reserves, and they function as credits in their accounts with the I.M.F., which can be used to buy hard currencies in times of debt or balance-of-payments problems. Members pay interest to the Fund on the balance of their holdings below their allocation, and they receive interest when their holdings are above their allocation.CrossRefGoogle Scholar

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Page 409 note 2 Sutton, Mary, ‘Introduction’, in Killick, Tony (ed.), The IMF and Stabilization: developing country experiences (New York, 1984), p. 14.Google Scholar

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Page 409 note 4 Brett, loc. cit. pp. 44–5.

Page 410 note 1 Ibid. pp. 45–7.

Page 410 note 2 Farnsworth, Clyde M., ‘A Dramatic Change at the IMF’, in Kojm (ed.), op. cit. pp. 101–2.Google Scholar

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Page 411 note 1 Peter T. Kilborn, ‘Tough Talk by U.S.: new development for IMF’, in ibid. pp. 131–2.

Page 411 note 2 Farnsworth, loc. cit. p. 103. In 1983, the Reagan Administration supported the western European consensus on a second five-year term for Jacques de Larosière after his achievements concerning the debt crisis. Paul Volcker, Chief of the Federal Reserve Board, also voiced strong support for the Director's new activism. De Larosière turned over the helm of the I.M.F. to a fellow Frenchman, Camdessus, Michel, on 16 January 1987.Google Scholar

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Page 416 note 2 Sutton, loc. cit. p. 14.

Page 416 note 3 Williamson, op. cit. p. 667. See also Dell, op. cit. pp. 18–19.

Page 416 note 4 ‘Towards the New International Economic Order’, p. 20.

Page 416 note 5 ‘The IMF's Role in Developing Countries’ in Finance and Development, 21, 3 September 1984, p. 26. This is an exchange between Tony Killick, Director of the Overseas Development Institute, London, and Nowzad, Bahram, Editor of Finance and Development.Google Scholar

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Page 420 note 4 ‘Background Notes on the IMF’, p. 106. See also Cohen, op. cit. p. 150.

Page 420 note 5 ‘The Arusha Initiative’, p. 17.

Page 420 note 6 Bernstein, op. cit. p. 8.

Page 421 note 1 Cf. Callaghy, Thomas M., ‘The Ritual Dance of the Debt Game’, in Africa Report, 29, 5, 0910 1984, pp. 22–5.Google Scholar

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Page 424 note 1 Gran, Development by People, pp. 127–8.

Page 424 note 2 Ibid. p. 138.

Page 424 note 3 Young, op. cit. pp. 179–82; and Gran, ‘Zaire 1978’, pp. 11–12.

Page 424 note 4 Gran, (ed.), Zaire, pp. 3–4.

Page 425 note 1 Gran, ‘Zaire 1978’, p. 7.

Page 425 note 2 Katwala, Ghifem J., ‘Export-led Growth: the copper sector’, in Gran (ed.), Zaïre, pp. 130–4; also Gran's introduction, pp. –8.Google Scholar

Page 425 note 3 Gran, Development by People, p. 128.

Page 425 note 4 Gran (ed.), Zaïre, pp. 8–9.

Page 425 note 5 Ibid. p. 10.

Page 426 note 1 See Kanda, Ciamala, ‘Éléments de blocage du développement rural au Zaïre (Cas Luba du Kasai)’ in Cahiers économiques et sociaux (Kinshasa), XV, 3 09 1978, pp. 334–71.Google Scholar

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Page 426 note 5 Gran, Development by People, pp. 128–9.

Page 427 note 1 Gran (ed.), Zaïre, pp. 10–11.

Page 427 note 2 Gran, Development by People, p. 140.

Page 427 note 3 Gran, ‘Zaire 1978’, p. 16.

Page 427 note 4 Callaghy, loc. cit. p. 26.

Page 427 note 5 Gran (ed.), Zaïre, p. 7.

Page 428 note 1 Gran, Development by People, p. 137.

Page 428 note 2 Gran, ‘Zaire 1978’, p. 6.

Page 428 note 3 Ibid. p. 13.

Page 428 note 4 Kömer et al., ‘The Instruments of the “Financial Policeman”: meaning and content of IMF stabilisation Programmes’, in The IMF and the Debt Crisis, pp. 54–6; and Gran, Development by People, p. 126.Google Scholar

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Page 429 note 2 Helleiner, G. K., ‘The IMF and Africa in the 1980s’, in Essays in International Finance, 152, 07 1983, pp. 1819.Google Scholar

Page 429 note 3 Ibid. pp. 3 and 5.

Page 430 note 1 Gran, ‘Zaire 1978’, p. 9.

Page 430 note 2 Director-General of the International Labour Organisation, ‘The Impact of the Debt Situation on Employment and Human Conditions in Developing Countries’, Geneva, 1984, p. 3.

Page 430 note 3 Gran, Development by People, pp. 135–6.

Page 430 note 4 Helleiner, loc. cit. pp. 8–9 and 22.

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Page 431 note 2 Helleiner, loc. cit. p. 16.

Page 431 note 3 Camps, Miriam and Gwin, Catherine, Collective Management: the reform of global economic organizations (New York, 1981), p. 233.Google Scholar

Page 432 note 1 Mtei, E. I. M., ‘Africa and the IMF: an evolving relationship’, in Africa Report, 29, 5, September–October 1984, p. 21; and Parkinson, loc. cit. pp. 28 and 40. See also Saladin, loc. cit. pp. 39–41 and 45.Google Scholar

Page 432 note 2 Haq, Mahbub ul, The Poverty Curtain (New York, 1976), pp. 71–4, discussed in Gran (ed.), Zaire, pp. 21–2.Google Scholar

Page 432 note 3 Helleiner, loc. cit. pp. 15 and 20.

Page 432 note 4 Gran, Development by People, p. 140.

Page 432 note 5 Helleiner, loc. cit. pp. 12 and 14.

Page 432 note 6 See ‘The Terra Nova Statement’, p. 30.

Page 433 note 1 World Economic Outlook, p. 25. Total Fund quotas fell from 12 per cent of world imports in the early 1960s to 4 per cent in the 1980s after an increase. The decline is also dramatic in view of the fact that the sum of the current account imbalance in 1980 of a group comprising the majority of I.M.F. member-states was ten times the level recorded during the early 1960s, while quotes, by ways of contrast, increased by a factor of less than four.

Page 433 note 2 ‘Towards the New International Economic Order’, p. 27.

Page 433 note 3 World Economic Outlook, p. 24.

Page 433 note 4 Sutton, loc. cit. p. 12.

Page 433 note 5 Several African governments continue to make efforts to move Commonwealth Finance Ministers towards an L.D.C. perspective on the need for the I.M.F. to be reformed, particularly as regards its structure and style of management. At present, for example, attempts are being made to ensure that member-state ‘negotiations’ with the Fund are more meaningful, because as regards Africa these often seem to be ‘completed’ in Washington before the I.M.F. mission arrives in the host country.