Proposed reforms to the way the World Bank is governed tinker at the edges, promising only marginal improvements for developing countries; critics are stepping up the pressure for a fundamental rethink. The World Bank board will discuss a package of reforms to the way the Bank is governed at its annual meetings in October, hoping to agree a concrete set of actions by next spring. Despite calls from developing countries, civil society and others for root and branch change to address the Bank's g
Finance
Analysis
Africa and the making of adjustment
29 September 2008
Development economist and professor of African studies Howard Stein examines the evolution of policy in the Bank, focusing on how economists became hegemonic. In this essay he details the origin of structural adjustment, tracing its roots back to a set of neoliberal economists who gained influence at the Bank in the late 1970s.
