The policies of the International Monetary Fund
(IMF) and the World Bank are cruel, unfair, unjust and not
beneficial to any country. It is apparent through the actions of
both organizations that their primary motivation is not to help
developing countries but rather make profit for themselves and their
member nations. Also, it is clear through the results of their
involvement that the countries that receive aid are worse off after
their "help" regardless of the bank's intentions. One of the
goals of the IMF is:
To facilitate the expansion and balanced growth of international
trade, and to contribute thereby to the promotion and maintenance of
high levels of employment and real income and to the development of the
productive resources of all members as primary objectives of economic
policy. (http://www.imf.org/ official IMF website)
In reality the IMF promotes poverty, instability, subordination and
dependance on other nations. In the case of Ghana, the IMF lent
money to "help build their economy." But, in order to receive
this "help" they had to accept the terms of the World Bank's Structural
Adjustment plan, including privatization and cuts to subsidies.
What this translated to for the people of Ghana was not more stability
and a better economy, but suffering and death. In order to repay
the debt and the increasingly high interest rate, Ghana was forced to
stop growing food for internal consumption and begin growing cocoa for
export. This money was to be used to re-pay the debt to the IMF,
but the revenues from cocoa plummeted when the bottom fell out of the
cocoa market, and Ghana was forced to sell more goods for less profit,
making it impossible to pay off the debt, let alone import the food it
now needed to import because it was growing cocoa instead.
Remember, it was only by the direction of the IMF that they grow cocoa,
and the IMF instructed many other developing countries to do the same,
which is what caused the prices to drop. Low prices are good for
consumers like the countries to which Ghana was indebted, but fatal to
the innocent people of Ghana. The IMF promotes profit for it's
member countries but death and suffering for the counties it claims to
be helping.
In addition to mandatory export and import, the
World Bank required drastic reduction in the amount of government funds
for subsidies. In the case of Ghana, this meant elimination of
subsidies for medicine. Now, people who desperately needed
medicine to survive could no longer obtain it because it was too
expensive. Contrary to what the IMF apparently believes, it is
not conducive to a good, stable, economy if the majority of the
population in malnourished and dying because they are poor and can't
get the necessary food and medicine.
The credo of the IMF and the World Bank is to help
struggling nations. Instead of making the situations of these
countries better, they worsen it greatly, causing vast unnecessary
suffering for the sole purpose of benefiting already rich
nations. It is a nobel cause to genuinely want to help
'developing' countries so that they can provide for their people and
raise the standards of living within them, but that is not the motive
of the IMF and World Bank. Because they are controlled my
countries, like the US, that value money and capital over human life
and compassion, the goal becomes not to help these poor countries, but
to exploit them to make a profit, regardless of the consequences, which
is neither fair nor 'moral.'
The IMF needs to cancel its debts, and a new
organization, one that is not controlled by whichever country has the
most money, needs to be created to actually make positive change in the
developing world, change that will honestly help the people live
happier, more productive lives. The problem with the IMF arises
because representation, and the power to make decisions stem directly
from the amount of money a member nations contributes. The reason
for this is that the contributing countries don't see a need to be
charitable, to give as much as their capable of giving, and then decide
to use that money in the best interests of the needy countries.
Instead, there is still a notion that the money put into the Fund is
still belonging to that country and they are entitled to not only get
it back but make a profit on it. By allowing the IMF and its
member countries to make a profit off of what should be charitable help
causes it to become something completely unlike charity and in fact a
brutal, compassionless profit-making device, which is neither
beneficial nor just.
Indebted nations should ban together to boycott the
payment of debts. One reason is that the money that was loaned by
the IMF/World Bank was not requested by the people of the country and
in many cases was used to hurt and oppress them. The people who
were victimized by the use of the money are now being victimized again
by having to pay for it. In the Philippines, the IMF loaned money
not to the people of the Philippines but to its president-cum-dictator
Ferdinand Marcos, and it did so knowing full well that he has no
intention of using the money to help his people or his country and
instead spent it on "pet projects" and useless construction. When
Marcos left the Philippines to Hawaii in 1986 the IMF stuck the
innocent people of the Philippines with the approximately $28 Billion
(US) debt. The IMF's explanation for this obvious violation of
human values and humane ideals? "... they have to deal with the
economic realities they inherit." (quoted from Banking on Life and
Death video) In other words, the IMF didn't care that the people
never benefited from the moneys lent to them, or that they never asked
for the loans in the first place, they wanted to take money that was
badly needed for education and social services away from a poor country
and give it too the healthiest countries in the the world who were busy
spending their wealth making war and corruption. Countries should
not have to pay for money they never asked for or that was used to
brutalize them.
In addition to the pure moral implications of making
these countries pay, it is clear that, because of the high interest
payments imposed on them, many of these countries have already paid
back more than the amount loaned to them, although their debt continues
to increase. For most countries that still owe money, canceling
their debts would not mean that they loans wouldn't be paid back, since
many of the have already paid back the loans many times over. It
is clear that the only reason the IMF has not ceased asking for payment
is that it is greedy and inhumane. If the indebted nations banded
together and refused to pay their debts, it would not hurt the
countries of the IMF since they have their money back already.
What it would do is open their eyes to the cruelty they're promoting in
the name of "free trade," and would bring about a new organization that
was not governed by profit, but instead by humanitarian ideals and a
genuine desire to make the world a better place.
Topher Rhodes
11.24.03