One year after Oxfam study, IMF making progress on inequality agenda but still needs a fundamental shift
Sub-Saharan Africa
Infrastructure
News
Warming of Ethiopia-Eritrea relations puts proposed LAPSSET mega-project under microscope
Significant concerns also remain about environmental and social impacts of mega-infrastructure project partially financed by World Bank.
Infrastructure
News
IFC takes its first steps to address Bujagali dam complaints
IFC announces preliminary measures to address CAO complaints regarding Uganda's Bujagali dam, as project receives WBG refinancing boost.
Finance
Analysis
Mozambique and the IMF's get out of jail free card
Joseph Hanlon asks where the accountability for the Mozambique debt crisis lies and why the poor are once again paying the costs.
IFI governance
Background
Financial crisis 10 years on. Has the response to 2008 laid the foundations for the next?
Notes from the 19 April Civil Society Policy Forum session on the response to the 2008 financial crisis at the World Bank and IMF's Spring Meetings.
IFI governance
Background
The promotion of Public-Private Partnerships – exporting a failed model?
Notes from the 19 April Civil Society Policy Forum session on the World Bank's promotion of public-private partnerships at the World Bank and IMF's Spring Meetings.
IFI governance
Background
Can the World Bank improve energy access for the poor? The importance of transparency in achieving the SDGs
Notes from the 18 April Civil Society Policy Forum session on the World Bank's approach to financing energy access at the Work Bank and IMF's Spring Meetings.
Conditionality
Analysis
Pro-poor or anti-poor? The World Bank and IMF’s approach to social protection
Stephen Kidd critiques Bretton Woods Institutions' approach to targeted social protection systems, arguing the poor lose out the most.
Gender
News
#MeToo arrives at World Bank as it publishes Gender-Based Violence Action Plan
World Bank publishes GBV Action Plan for developing-country projects, while internal sexual harassment cases from 1980s are brought to World Bank Ombudsman.
Social services
News
CSOs urge IFC to divest from for-profit school chain
CSOs urge investors to divest from private school provider Bridge International Academies; IFC remains investor, despite WDR’s concerns with private education.
Accountability
Analysis
The IMF in insecure fragile states: why being absent should no longer be an option
While there is scope to improve IMF operations in all fragile states, ahead of the forthcoming publication of the IMF IEO review of IMF work in fragile states, there is one fundamental change it must make to transform its effectiveness in fragile states: wherever it is possible, it must be present. No country should be left out.
Private Sector
Analysis
How the Bank’s push for microcredit failed the poor
Originally created to help the poor escape poverty and deprivation, the World Bank became the most important advocate for the commercialised microcredit model. Yet, critics argued it undermined the chances of sustainable and equitable development to create a poverty trap of historic proportions.
