FINANCE: Activists Prepare to ‘Contain’ World Bank, IMF Agenda

By Emad Mekay Reprint | | Print |

Emad Mekay

WASHINGTON, Sep 24 2002 (IPS) - Activists will be up in arms here this weekend – hoisting their puppets, loud drums and colourful banners to protest the policies of the World Bank and the International Monetary Fund (IMF) in the developing world.

Anti-corporate and anti-globalisation groups say they have scheduled dozens of events in the lead-up to Saturday and Sunday’s annual meetings of the two bodies. Demonstrations, teach-ins, vigils, and debates will cover issues ranging from the costly privatising of electricity grids in Africa to selling water for profit in Latin America.

The Bank and the Fund, which say they share many of the protesters’ concerns, say their sessions will focus on development aid to poor countries and problems in the world’s financial architecture, which have produced economic meltdowns in Argentina and other floundering Latin American countries.

“We will be discussing the issues that will not be discussed at the meetings,” said Marie Clarke, an activist with the U.S.-based anti-debt group, Jubilee USA Network, “issues like debt, poverty, and the failed policies of the two institutions.”

Washington critics of the entrenched economic system say they will be joined by dozens of campaigners from the developing world and busloads from across the country to protest “the catastrophic impact of debt, environmental abuse, reckless lending, and profit-driven economic policies” imposed by the two Washington-based institutions.

Activists have traditionally used the autumn meetings to voice their protest at the free market and pro-corporate policies of the two Bretton Woods institutions and to bring attention to their movement.

Specifically, they are demanding an end to structural adjustment programmes and a halt to financing for environmentally destructive infrastructure projects. They also have called on the Bank and IMF to open up their meetings and allow public participation decision-making.

One reformer predicts few results from the protests, but says the institutions may budge slightly on trade liberalisation and developing countries’ representation in the two bodies.

“I think we’ll see absolutely business as usual on the HIPC (Heavily Indebted Poor Countries) / debt issue, another round of the same stuff of over-optimistic projections, lack of money on the table for commitments that have already been made,” said Nancy Birdsall, president of the Washington-based Centre for Global Development and former executive vice president of the Inter-American Development Bank.

“Modest progress on a couple of issues but lots of business as usual over the other big issues,” she added.

After last year’s terrorist attacks in the United States, campaigners here toned down their opposition to the type of globalisation spearheaded by bodies including the Bank and IMF, World Trade Organisation (WTO), World Economic Forum, and the Group of Seven (G7) industrial powers.

Organisers say they expect “thousands” of protestors at the weekend meetings. By comparison, some 30,000 turned up for the 1999 WTO talks in Seattle and more than 20,000 protested against the Bank and Fund here the following year.

Only a few thousand protested during the two institutions’ smaller meetings earlier this year.

Although the chief organising groups had vowed non-violence, they, as well as Bank and IMF officials and local police, say they are worried that the protests could attract self-described “anarchists” and the so-called “Black Bloc”.’

The groups’ attacks against police and property during recent global conferences – most recently last year’s G-8 Summit (G7 plus Russia) in Genoa, Italy – sparked violent reactions by police.

But protest organisers say police are trying to demonise them by suggesting terrorists might use the cover of their demonstrations to carry out violent acts.

The police accusations lack credibility, said Martin Thomas of the major umbrella group for protestors, the Mobilization for Global Justice. Of the dozens of groups joining his protests, most are planning “colourful, safe and fun” activities, not violent ones, he added.

Some of the activists say that instead of trying to block officials from reaching meeting venues – the strategy during many previous protests – they will try to “quarantine” them from leaving the building, a symbol of trying to keep their “virus-like” ideas from spreading.

Ideas the activists are pushing include assisting poor countries to use aid effectively, particularly in sectors such as education, health and water. Also at issue will be how to transform pledges of new aid, particularly by the United States, into real results.

The question of how to ensure that debt relief is sustained, especially under the HIPC initiative, will also generate vocal demands.

Birdsall said the two-day meetings will provide a way for developing countries to have more voice and apply some pressure in a multilateral setting and to describe the high costs they pay for agricultural subsidies in the rich nations.

She also predicted that there will be new demands on “the very deep question of improving representation of the developing countries either on the level of votes or on the level of board representation” inside the Bank and IMF, often dominated by the powerful seven most industrialised countries.