In June the IMF released an ex post assessment of its 2010 lending programme to Greece which described a series of errors and found that the Fund consciously chose to break its own rules on the sustainability of the programme.
Analysis
Environment
Analysis
The World Bank and the Green Climate Fund: "an ironic contradiction"?
Since the creation of the UN Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC) Green Climate Fund (GCF) in 2010, concerns have grown about the World Bank's potential role in designing policies to determine the allocation of resources for adaptation and mitigation activities in developing countries.
Social services
Analysis
The Doing Business review: a test of World Bank leadership
By this year's October annual meetings, we will know what the World Bank board has decided on what happens next to that institution's controversial and most popular publication, the Doing Business report.
Environment
Analysis
Working paper: The private sector and climate change adaptation
This paper looks at PPCR projects implemented under the World Bank's private sector lending arm, the International Finance Corporation, highlighting important questions concerning the design, implementation and operation of projects financed from public climate funds using private sector actors. In summary, the analysis suggests that the integration of private sector projects into national planning processes and strategies is crucial.
Environment
Analysis
Climate Investment Funds Monitor 7
The Climate Investment Funds (CIFs) are financing instruments designed to pilot low-carbon and climate-resilient development through the multilateral development banks (MDBs). They are comprised of two trust funds - the Clean Technology Fund (CTF) and the Strategic Climate Fund (SCF).
Rights
Analysis
World Bank on jobs: a "significant departure" or "business as usual"?
The opening sentences of the 2013 World Development Report Jobs, could not be clearer: "Jobs are the cornerstone of economic and social development". Brendan Martin of UK NGO Public World examines the policy implications for developing economies, trade unions and the wider development community.
Accountability
Analysis
The IFIs in 2012: year in review
2012 saw continued crisis in Europe, but also a turning point in the leadership selection of the World Bank. The choice of Dr Jim Yong Kim as new president, who brings a background in public health in developing countries, marked the first ever selection of a development practitioner to lead the institution. However, large bureaucracies are slow to change, as the International Monetary Fund (IMF) found out with its inability to extricate itself from the morass developing in the eurozone.
Social services
Analysis
IFIs' new "house of cards" in Central and Eastern Europe
IFIs are renewing their focus on Central and Eastern European states. This comes amidst fears that growth in the region needs to be rekindled. The World Bank has promised more funding for countries at risk of instability. However, IMF loans being negotiated with Romania and Hungary have met with controversy.
Infrastructure
Analysis
The World Bank and industrial policy: Hands off or hands on?
Former deputy secretary general of UNCTAD Carlos Fortin, of the Institute of Development Studies, examines the Bank's record on industrial policy over the last 20 years and shows that the Bank's position is more nuanced.
Accountability
Background
Climate Investment Funds Monitor survey
The Bretton Woods Project launched the twice-yearly Climate Investment Funds (CIFs) Monitor in 2010 to track the development of the CIFs and highlight concerns. As it approaches our third year, we would like your input into how we can improve the CIFs Monitor to ensure that it remains a valuable resource for civil society and other interested stakeholders of the CIFs.
Environment
Analysis
Climate Investment Funds Monitor 6
The Climate Investment Funds (CIFs) are financing instruments designed to pilot low-carbon and climate-resilient development through the multilateral development banks (MDBs). They are comprised of two trust funds - the Clean Technology Fund (CTF) and the Strategic Climate Fund (SCF).
Social services
Analysis
Infrastructure as an asset class
A forthcoming report on private equity infrastructure funds by Nicholas Hildyard of NGO The Corner House, More than bricks and mortar, looks at the connections between infrastructure funding and international financial markets, and at the wider political project that infrastructure embodies. In this briefing, Hildyard argues that the transformation of infrastructure into an asset class has environmental and social implications far beyond what can be handled by stronger safeguards on investments.
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6 April 2022
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8 November 2021
IMF surveillance and climate change transition risks
New briefing by ActionAid USA and the Bretton Woods Project highlights research showing that IMF policy advice has undermined a just energy transition since the Paris Agreement was signed.