What do the World Bank and IMF do?
The World Bank and IMF are public institutions owned by the governments of the world. Their activities, ostensibly intended to promote “development”, are mandated by the national governments of the wealthiest countries, which also provide much of the funding they use. Even on the basis of widely available statistics released by the two institutions themselves, it is certainly debatable whether the Bank and IMF act for the public good. Both the World Bank and the IMF operate in a highly secretive matter where substantive decisions are not open to public scrutiny — of either citizens in the countries which make funds available, or of citizens in countries which are supposed to benefit — until well after they have taken effect, if at all. Like the DC Control Board, they are unelected organizations that make decisions for a disenfranchised constituency. The two institutions have largely failed in their stated goals. In most of a group of 83 poor countries that have received substantial I
