As the World Bank Group (WBG) and International Monetary Fund (IMF) prepare for the Spring Meetings in Washington DC from 21-26 April, the United States administration’s executive order – which mandates a 180-day review of the country’s membership in all international intergovernmental organisations – casts a shadow over the future of US policy at both institutions. With the Bretton Woods Institutions’ (BWIs; i.e., the Bank and Fund) public outreach unusually quiet, particularly on issues like gender and climate, civil society expects the Spring Meetings to be absent of contentious public debates or significant outcomes, at a time when answers on the future of multilateralism and the BWIs’ policies on debt, austerity, climate and gender are sorely needed.
On 1 April, IMF Managing Director Kristalina Georgieva spoke on Reuters Live, saying that the IMF will slightly lower its growth forecast in its upcoming World Economic Outlook, citing unpredictable US policy. This rosy outlook quickly evaporated, as the introduction of new US tariffs just days later exposed the risks of the Fund’s forecasts, with major investment banks raising recession odds. As UK-based civil society organisation (CSO) Debt Justice argues, the tariffs, set to hit low- and middle-income countries (LMICs), will exacerbate their economic challenges amid an already metastasising debt crisis.
Ode to the private sector: is there no alternative?
A Financial Times op-ed by World Bank President Ajay Banga on 1 April set the Springs stage for one major player: the private sector. The words appeared carefully curated to reintroduce the Bank’s role as it was “originally intended”, which according to the Bank’s President, was “shaped by US interests…to forge a global economic landscape ripe for private sector investment” (not, apparently, merely as a lender to countries struggling with debt in a post-World War context), lifting the veil on what many in the Global South have insisted is the driving force behind the BWIs’ influence to this day. Acknowledging constrained public resources, Banga emphasised the importance of returns for investors. He made no mention of key themes like climate and gender, instead lamenting on the Bank’s past of “drifting into humanitarian efforts”, and stressed job creation to tackle “the root causes of crime, fragility and mass migration.”
Despite finally conceding the “billions to trillions” agenda was flawed – admitting it was wrong to assume “private capital was sitting on the sidelines, ready to be deployed” – the Bank is doubling down on the same failed model. It now claims that “private investment flows only where the right conditions exist,” i.e., a “strong infrastructure foundation and a predictable regulatory environment.” Yet, given the extensive ways in which the Bank has been advancing this agenda – through de-risking measures such as the creation of the Private Sector Investment Lab, the expanded use of guarantees, and increasing reliance on its conditionality-laden policy-based lending instrument, Development Policy Financing (see Report, Gambling with the planet’s future?) – it is impossible to discern anything new in the approach.
Even the Bank’s Chief Economist, Indermit Gill, acknowledged in the 2024 International Debt Report that “since 2022, foreign private creditors have extracted nearly US$141 billion more in debt service payments from public sector borrowers in developing countries than they disbursed in new financing” (see Observer Spring 2023). Civil society and economists like Jayati Ghosh have long warned of the failures of this approach. Ghosh recently criticised the BWIs for offering “subsidies and risk underwriting” to attract private capital without “establishing clear conditions, enforcement mechanisms, and regulations to curb monopolistic and anticompetitive behavior” – and without delivering meaningful development results.
World Bank: questions swirl around IDA21 replenishment, reviews and reforms
Given uncertainty over US positioning and its possible repercussions, Bank watchers anxiously await the final policy package of the 21st replenishment for the International Development Association (IDA21), the Bank’s low-income country lending arm, likely to be published in time for the Spring Meetings. While $100 billion was pulled together at the pledging meeting in South Korea in December (see Observer Winter 2024), civil society are yet to learn whether the challenging new context of decreasing official development assistance (ODA) of some key donors will affect the financing package, and if calls to improve gaps across themes like climate, gender, public financing of essential services and fragility have been heeded (see Observer Spring 2025).
Elsewhere, several processes are due to be reviewed at the Bank as it continues its implementation of accountability ‘reforms’ (see Observer Spring 2024), of which civil society awaits possible updates at the Meetings. While unconfirmed, rumours have circulated about a potential merger of the two independent accountability mechanisms – the Compliance Advisor Ombudsman, which serves the Bank’s private sector arms, and the Inspection Panel, which serves its public sector arms. The Bank is also beginning the process of a two-year review of the Performance Standards of the International Finance Corporation (IFC), its private sector arm; an essential moment for human rights advocates who demand permanent institutional change, greater regulation and a stronger accountability and remedy framework in response to repeated human rights abuse cases in IFC-funded projects over recent years (see Observer Spring 2025).
The fourth Shareholding Review of the World Bank will also begin in 2025, providing a potential opportunity to make progress on longstanding calls for fairer representation of all shareholders. The Group of 77 in a January statement noted it “follows a global movement advocating for a greater voice and representation of emerging and underrepresented developing countries within international financial institutions.” In the current political climate, however, this will be a contentious process for many shareholders, due to fear of rocking the boat with a current formula that could produce unusual rebalances between global powers. While just a reference point, the existing formula actually shows under-representation for some Global North shareholders, and China is under-represented by 7 per cent.
Amongst the failings of “billions to trillions” agenda, climate advocates will await updates on the Bank’s ‘Mission 300’ – a joint initiative between the World Bank and the African Development Bank to provide energy access to 300 million people in Sub-Saharan Africa by 2030. Concerns persist that the initiative relies heavily on energy privatisation and liberalisation to attract private investments, promoting de-risking and deregulation methods that fail to adequately distribute risks (see Observer Winter 2024), while doubling down on liquefied natural gas as a ‘transition fuel’ in many target countries – diverting finance from proven renewable alternatives.
IMF tightens the fiscal straight jacket
As IMF Managing Director Kristalina Georgieva stated at the Annual Meetings in October, LMICs face an “unforgiving combination of low growth and high debt,” noting that “in a world of more wars and more insecurity, defence may well keep rising while aid budgets fall further behind the growing needs of developing countries.” With key stakeholders decreasing their aid spending – and Debt Justice reporting that debt payments by lower-income countries as a percentage of government revenue now surpass levels seen in the 1990s – CSOs, faith-based groups across Christian and other religious traditions, and Pope Francis himself, are intensifying calls for a global debt jubilee in 2025.
The Joint IMF-World Bank Debt Sustainability Framework for low-income countries (LIC-DSF), which shapes sovereign debt restructuring decisions, multilateral lending, and government and private sector finance, is being reviewed. With most LICs trapped in a dysfunctional debt relief system, not least the much-criticised G20 Common Framework for Debt Treatment, and decades of IMF-imposed austerity, CSOs are calling on the Fund to address its overly optimistic assumptions on growth prospects and debt carrying capacity, and to incorporate social and human rights factors and developmental needs in its debt sustainability analyses (see Inside the Institutions, What is the World Bank & IMF DSF for LICs?).
Yet the IMF, constrained by its conflicting roles as both creditor, arbiter and policy advisor, continues to delay comprehensive debt relief by treating the crisis as a liquidity issue rather than a structural crisis – even as the Bank’s chief economist argues that, “It’s time to face the reality: the poorest countries facing debt distress need debt relief if they are to have a shot at lasting prosperity.” The IMF’s lending patterns, aligned with US and European interests, are evident in Argentina’s new IMF deal, agreed just ahead of the Springs, despite strong opposition from civil society and political groups as the country continues to suffer from the fallout of its 2018 IMF programme (see Observer Spring 2025).
The Fund is also set to begin two policy reviews – the Comprehensive Surveillance Review and the Review of Program Design and Conditionality. CSOs are however facing barriers to participation: in September 2024, over 70 CSOs called for a review of the IMF’s 2015 Guidelines on CSO Engagement and demanded clear, mandatory rules for civil society engagement. Despite assurances from Georgieva at the CSO Town Hall during the Annual Meetings, there has been no official communication on reviews’ status or consultation processes (see Dispatch Annuals 2024).
While CSOs welcomed the reviews, they stressed the need for meaningful implementation, noting past failures like the 2018 Conditionality Review (see Observer Spring 2025). Hopes for reform on the Fund’s role in exacerbating gender inequality and restricting climate action remain slim, as US positions keep management and other shareholders low-profile on these ‘sensitive issues’. This reflects wider concerns over gender being demonised and deprioritised, with the US pushing regressive views that threaten women’s rights (see Observer Spring 2025), alongside its retreat on climate action. Yet, beyond just holding the line, CSOs call on the IMF to address the gendered harms of fiscal consolidation and austerity through mandatory women’s rights and distributional impact assessments as well as meaningful engagement with feminist networks (see Observer Summer 2024), and to integrate climate risks into its operations to avoid deepening fossil fuel dependence and constraining green industrial strategies (see Observer Autumn 2021).
As the IMF is also preparing to outline options for quota realignment under its 17th General Review of Quotas in June, CSOs continue to push for reform after 20 years of failure, highlighting the voting power imbalances where Sub-Saharan Africa holds under 5 per cent and the V20 only 5.4 per cent (see Briefing, A Way Out for IMF Reform). The failure of the 16th Review in 2023 reflects resistance from key shareholders, while the contentious geopolitical environment, including China’s lack of adequate representation and the US veto, makes substantial progress unlikely.
Reimagining multilateralism: looking ahead to FfD4
In light of uncertainty and low expectations for positive outcomes this Springs, especially as the US is yet to appoint executive directors for either institution – making moving policy positions forward unlikely – Global South states and civil society are turning their attention to the Fourth UN Financing for Development Conference (FfD4) in Seville, Spain, from 30 June to 3 July. Since the first FfD conference in Monterrey in 2002 – held amid post-Asian crisis turmoil and backlash against BWI-led austerity – the process has been key to centre the United Nations in global financial governance and address the BWIs’ democratic deficit (see Observer Spring 2025). Civil society and Global South governments continue to call for a review of the international financial ecosystem, despite resistance from Global North actors. The Spring Meetings is the last gathering of governors before FfD4.
FfD4 is also increasingly a space of interest for discussing shifting debt governance out of the IMF and the Paris Club’s – a grouping of bilateral creditors – hands, with the latest FfD4 draft proposing an intergovernmental process at the UN, where the Least Developed Countries Group is advocating for a sovereign debt workout mechanism under UN auspices, potentially reshaping (and diminishing) the IMF’s role over time. This aligns with calls from various UN fora for systemic reform of the debt architecture, including from the UN’s Human Rights Council and Global South states at the UNCTAD debt management conference (see Observer Spring 2025).
