Astral Codex Ten

IMF

4 min read

IMF

Article

IMF is a recurring organization in the Astral Codex Ten archive, appearing 5 times across 5 issues between May 04, 2021 and October 01, 2024. The archive places it in contexts such as “operations of the IMF and the army of well-paid lobbyists in Washington”; “operations of the IMF and the army of well-paid lobbyists”; “negotiating partly through the IMF”. It most often appears alongside China, Japan, South Korea.

Metadata

  • Category: Organizations
  • Mention count: 5
  • Issue count: 5
  • First seen: May 04, 2021
  • Last seen: October 01, 2024

Appears In

Source Context

Recovered passages from the original issue text. When the raw archive preserved outbound links inside the source passage, they are listed directly under the quote.

Book Review: A Brief History Of Neoliberalism
May 04, 2021 · Original source
Harvey comes across a little better when talking about debt crises in Mexico, Latin America, and beyond. My understanding here is something like: the Volcker Shock caused a sharp increase in the price of the US dollar. Latin American countries had taken out a lot of dollar-denominated debt, which (as the dollar rose) suddenly became much bigger. They had been prepared to pay off their old debts, but not their new, much-bigger debts, so they had to cut deals with their creditors. These were mostly American banks, and the American government was backing them. The banks and government, negotiating partly through the IMF, weren’t really willing to compromise and demanded quite a lot of the money back. But also, as a condition for what compromises they did make, they demanded these countries neoliberalize. The banks/US/IMF said this was so that they could break their addiction to debt and overspending, have functional economies, and be able to pay off what they owed eventually. Obviously Harvey isn’t buying it, and says it was a plot for the American rich to enhance their power, plus crushing all fair and decent systems that might have provided an alternative to the dystopia they were planning at home.
Book Review: How Asia Works
June 28, 2021 · Original source
The rich world cannot be expected to save poor countries from bad politicians. But the likes of Mahathir and Suharto were not so terrible. What seems most wrong in all this is that wealthy nations, and the economic institutions that they created like the World Bank and the International Monetary Fund, provided lousy developmental advice to poor states that had no basis in historical fact. Once again: there is no significant economy that has developed successfully through policies of free trade and deregulation from the get-go. What has always been required is proactive interventions - the most effective of them in agriculture and manufacturing - that foster early accumulation of capital and technological learning. Our unwillingness to look this historical fact in the face leaves us with a world in which scores of countries remain immiserated; and in which rural poverty nourishes terrorist groups that echo those suppressed in south-east Asian countries, but which now directly threaten the citizens of rich nations. It is not easy to implement the policies discussed in this book, especially land reform. However I repeat what others concluded after the Second World War: that to turn away from such policies indicates that the world is acceptable to us as it is. Take a look at south Asia, the Middle East and Africa, and ask yourself if it is.
Highlights From The Comments On "How Asia Works"
July 01, 2021 · Original source
No direct inline source block was recovered for this mention.
Your Book Review: Why Nations Fail
August 25, 2023 · Original source
No direct inline source block was recovered for this mention.
Preliminary Milei Report Card
October 01, 2024 · Original source
No direct inline source block was recovered for this mention.