Geography Reference
In-Depth Information
2.4 THE
DEVELOPMENT
PROGRAMMES OF
GLOBAL
INSTITUTIONS
This chapter tells the story of academic, institutional and popular opposi-
tion to the development programmes and regulatory missions of many of
the West's global capitalist institutions. Specifically, the Washington-based
development banks, international financial regulatory institutions, and
global business economic forums are the focus. In addition, global institu-
tions which made the rules governing the post-1948 multilateral trading
system known as The General Agreement on Tariffs and Trade (GATT)
and its 1994 successor, the World Trade Organization (WTO), are also
implicated in this top-down display of capitalism's power. So they too are
critically assessed. Self-serving objectives were always part of aid and
assistance efforts by the advanced nations of the global North. Many
policies and programmes devised by global and governmental 'develop-
ment institutions' had the profiteering of Western, core nations and
transnational corporate interests very much in mind.
Overall it can be argued that the record is a disappointing one of
tunnel vision, misguided philanthropy and, in later decades, destruc-
tion and disappointment, rather than progress and transformative
changes for the better (see Chapter 2.3 for globalization's effects). Too
often the development practices of many of the West's development and
aid agencies - both global and national by remit - have been at odds
with declared programme objectives that hypothetically promised cli-
ent states development and/or modernity. Though alternative paths
were advocated by a succession of UN commissions, human rights
interest groups, and civil society, most institutional 'messages' to further
