Suchergebnisse

Since the 19th century, governments have joined to create specialized international organizations to control the effects of new technologies and to regulate increased economic ties between nations. The number of such organizations has increased dramatically since the Second World War, and it is likely that this approach to international problem solving through permanent, specialized agencies will continue. Yet for nations to act effectively in concert, the organization through which they act must command the respect of its members, and they must abide by the organization's decisions. Moreover, the way in which these decisions are made—the formal procedures and informal practices followed by the organization's members—will have a direct and immediate effect on the members' observance of them. Even the generally accepted substantive rules of an organization are not likely to be observed if they are perceived as arbitrarily applied without proper voting safeguards.

Critics of the IMF & the World Bank have long suggested that these two international economic organizations routinely fail to achieve their development goals & should hence be abolished. This article explores empirically whether the IMF & World Bank's financial assistance to developing countries have failed or succeeded in promoting economic development across the developing world. The empirical analysis reveals that aid & loans from the IMF & the World Bank have a positive effect on economic development in developing countries that are democracies, but have a negligible or sometimes negative effect on development in developing nations that are autocratic. Thus the impact of funds from the IMF & the World Bank on development is critically dependent on the political regime type of countries that receive assistance from these institutions. Given this central finding, the article proposes three policy goals that U.S. administrations should pursue to enhance the IMF & the World Bank's ability to promote economic development in developing countries. Tables, Figures. Adapted from the source document.

Award date: 1990 ; Supervisor: A. Cassese ; First made available online 3 September 2015