NEW PUBLICATIONS

Revealing PSI: People’s resistance against policy conditionalities of the IMF

A Policy Support Instrument (PSI) is a policy consisting of abstract terms and conditions. Usually, high profile IMF and government officials discuss such policies. Academics, researchers, and analysts working on policy issues understand the salient points, but it is extremely difficult for the general public to understand the logic and loopholes of such a deal.

During the recent visit of the IMF delegation to Bangladesh, there were significant discussions and debates around their PSI offer. Different stakeholders emerged, voicing their concern about the issue through the media and other outlets. Civil society members, activists, business groups and the media in Bangladesh once again proved themselves active in the resistance against IMF impositions. The news media published reports, opinion, comments, and analysis on the issue, raising awareness all around the country.

This report is as much a commentary as a compilation of formerly scattered information about PSI, and has attempted to demystify PSI going from the definition to the analysis. Different reports and views of newspapers also help to shed light on the issue and to document what happened with respect to the PSI agreement.

Voice has published this report with the intention of disseminating all the pertinent details for the readers, and documenting the efforts of the many social movements in Bangladesh to resist pressures of international financial institutions like the IMF.

A battle is currently being raged in the global marketplace between global and local economies. However, with the force of millions of dollars of global capital supporting it, and a powerful influence over the local governments and policymakers, the global side is definitely not playing fair.

The World Bank (WB) and the International Monetary Fund (IMF) have been lending money to Bangladesh for many years, ostensibly under the banner of ‘aid’. These loans inevitably come tied with conditions, which hinder the country’s growth and keep down its people. IMF-sanctioned policies, such as privatization of public services, reduction of trade tariffs, supplanting local industries with cash-crop oriented export industries, and many more, have left Bangladesh and its people at the mercy of a free market economy which has no qualms with profiting from the poverty of others.

These conditions, handed down from the lenders above, have resulted in policies of fiscal and social reform that have mercilessly destroyed our local economies and caused the suffering of many people. VOICE has published this report with the intention of outlining some of the IMF conditions and their subsequent effect on our country. We have presented a seminar summary as well as a reference section of media articles. We hope that this report will bring to light the injustices of the IMF and serve as a potent weapon in the struggle against IFI sanctions.

The World Bank and the International Monetary Fund, for the past few decades, have provided third-world countries with loans and grants in the name of such lofty pretexts as ‘poverty reduction’ and ‘international development’. These loans inevitably come tied with conditions which hinder the country’s growth, a case of stepping on someone’s chest even as they are being helped up.

The detrimental effects these conditions have had on Bangladesh are immeasurable, but that does not mean they should pass unnoticed. VOICE has published this report, a combination of media articles, two insightful essays, and the summary of a seminar conducted by VOICE on the eve of the WB-IMF Annual General Meeting held in Washington DC in 2007 on the subject of the subjugation of Bangladesh to World Bank and IMF policies.

This report will examine the neo-liberal hegemony currently ensnaring the country from different perspectives, and also stand as a historical analysis of the role of IFIs in Bangladesh thus far.

OTHER PUBLICATIONS

01. Media, Development and Poverty Alleviation

02. Discussion Meeting on Communication Rights: Perspective of Bangladesh

03. Peoples Caravan for Justice and Sovereignty

04. People’s movement for Life and Livelihood

05. Monga in Media