The IMF warns of a decade ahead of ‘tepid growth’ and ‘popular discontent’, with the poorest economies worst off. But as with inaction on Gaza, little is being done multilaterally to avert the imminent catastrophe. Grim IMF prognosis Noting the world economy has lost $3.3 trillion since 2020, International Monetary Fund (IMF)
Author: Jomo Kwame Sundaram, IPS
Rich nation hypocrisy accelerating global heating
Rich nations’ climate hypocrisy is accelerating global heating, pushing the planet closer to irreversible catastrophe, with its worst consequences borne by the poorest, both countries and peoples. Climate injustice While official and other discourses acknowledge or even invoke the need for collective responsibility, the disparity in culpability between wealthy nations and the
Developing countries’ government debt crises loom larger
Developing countries are being blamed for having borrowed and spent irresponsibly. But they have only been doing what foreign powers and financial interests have urged them to do. Since the 2008 global financial crisis, developing nations have been told to borrow massively from private finance, even at exorbitant interest rates, to
IMF urges non-alignment in second cold war
The IMF no. 2 recommends non-alignment as the best option for developing countries in the second Cold War as geopolitics threatens already dismal prospects for the world economy and wellbeing. IMF warning Ominously, International Monetary Fund (IMF) First Deputy Managing Director Gita Gopinath warns, “With the weakest world growth prospects in decades
Building popular national economic alternatives
Viable, popular national economic alternatives require conditions to help build and sustain them. An independent, accountable government can ensure supportive institutions, including laws. National economies For the Global South, globalization has often meant renewed foreign domination. While dating back to the age of empire, foreign domination is less evident in post-colonial times,
Hapless New Year for Global South
As dire economic predictions for 2023 did not materialise, pundits began 2024 far more optimistically. But policy ghosts from the last half-century will likely undermine such wishful thinking. Optimistic forecasts As New Year celebrations of different cultures decline with the coming of spring in the northern hemisphere, it is useful to review
Imperialism, globalisation and its discontents
Imperialism continues to dominate the world. Globalisation is losing to some of its anti-theses, but imperialism still rules, increasingly by law, albeit in changing even contradictory ways. Hence, we live in challenging times. It is often difficult to see the main challenges we face as there seem to be so many.
Neocolonial ISDS abused, biased, costly, and grossly unfair
Investor-State Dispute Settlement (ISDS) provisions in international trade and investment agreements – long abused by opportunists with means – are slowly being rejected by cautious governments. Developing country governments need to be much more wary of ISDS and its implications, and should urgently withdraw from existing commitments. They should expunge ISDS
PPPs’ private gain at public expense
At high cost and with dubious efficiency, public-private partnerships (PPPs) have increased private profits at the public expense. PPPs have proved costly in financing public projects. PPPs’ high costs Eurodad has shown high PPP costs mainly due to private partners’ high-profit expectations. Complex PPP contracts typically involve high transaction costs. Worse, contracts
World Bank enables private capture of profits, public resources
The World Bank insists commercial finance is necessary for achieving economic recovery and the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs), but does little to ensure profit-hungry commercial finance serves the public interest. By failing to address pressing challenges within their purview, the second-ever Bretton Woods institutions’ (BWIs) annual meetings on the African continent,