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Home >> Global Organizations World Bank and IMF Macedonia: The Case of the Abused PCL
Sam Vaknin, Ph.D. - 6/5/2011
In January 2011, the Republic of Macedonia became the first country to benefit from the IMF’s PCL (Precautionary Credit Line): a contingent “insurance policy” of c. $650 million USD. At the time, the Executive Board of the IMF and the Fund’s Deputy Managing Director Naoyuki Shinohara made very clear that they expect Macedonia to not withdraw money from the facility. So did Wes McGrew, the IMF Mission Director to Macedonia and Petar Gosev, then Governor of the country’s Central Bank. Lagarde Makes Sense for the IMF
Prof. Peter Morici - 5/27/2011
France's Finance Minister Christine Lagarde makes good sense to head the International Monetary Fund. She is experienced and well qualified, and for now, leadership of the IMF should be kept in European hands. European Should Head IMF
Prof. Peter Morici - 5/20/2011
The debate over whether a European or Asian should lead the International Monetary Fund involves more than symbolism. An Asian leader could be bad for free markets and the progress of the global economy. World Bank: Time To Ponder Over Its Fallacies
Bhuwan Thapaliya - 1/10/2008
I have not been to the United States of America, so there is no question of me visiting the World Bank’s Washington DC office. But those who were fortunate enough to visit the World Bank’s office told me that there is this slogan, “The purpose of the World Bank is to fight poverty with passion,” displayed in its Washington DC office. Polit – X's and Polis – Y's Billionaires
Aleksandar Dimishkovski - 10/8/2007
Where even the common people can't tell the difference between 5 and 50 billion euros, governance, policies and politics are usually the perverse and in the same time the most efficient solutions for instant material gain. Or, it is so at least in the neighborhood of the birthplace of the Polis - The Balkans. World Bank Policies: Pros and Cons
Gina-Marie Cheeseman - 9/17/2007
Created in 1944 during a conference in Bretton Woods, New Hampshire, the World Bank according to its website, helps developing countries worldwide with “financial and technical assistance” by providing “low interest loans, interest free credits and grants to developing countries for education, health, infrastructure, communications, and many other purposes.” The World Bank’s mission is to “help reduce poverty.” Democratic Accountability and the Doha Round
Prof. Peter Morici - 9/17/2007
History teaches that open markets best promote economic progress, but markets without good rules can pitch us into chaos, and the rule makers must be broadly accountable or tyranny will follow. In our effort to bring order and fairness to global markets, the Doha Round of World Trade Organization negotiations could sabotage democratic accountability by relegating tough issues to unelected bureaucrats in Geneva. Leapfrogging Transition
Sam Vaknin, Ph.D. - 8/30/2007
In many countries in transition cellular phones are more ubiquitous than the fixed-line kind. Teledensity is vanishingly low throughout swathes of Central and Eastern Europe (CEE). Broadband and e-commerce are distant rumors (ISDN is available in theory but not so in practice - DSL and ADSL are not available at all). Rare phone lines - especially in urban centers - are still being multiplexed and shared by 4-8 subscribers, greatly reducing both quality and usability. Terrestrial television competes ferociously with satellite TV, though cable penetration is low. Internet access is prohibitively... Economic Development
Kamala Sarup - 8/27/2007
There will always be an increase in absolute wealth, in varying amounts, by all countries because some wealth will inevitably spill over from the rich countries to the poor ones via trade, industrial globalization (the transfer of businesses from rich to poor countries) and repatriated income from nationals working in foreign lands. However, a perennial state of poverty in a nation leads inevitably to revolution, or emigration, or both, or to absorption by other countries. Why Are Developing Countries Losing The Five Star Status Race?
Naseem Javed - 8/25/2007
The race for the global image repositioning is getting fiercely competitive as more and more countries are improving their softer image, claiming the right to produce good quality exportable brands for the international markets. Poised and confident, they want to play the marketing game on a global scale. The West, in the meanwhile has almost abandoned manufacturing, ignoring research development and creating vacuums, which have resulted in global shifts, which have been moving rapidly towards Asia and other regions. As this tectonic shift continues, it will have opened doors among the highly ... How Victimhood Affects The Economy
Aleksandar Dimishkovski - 8/17/2007
One of the most dangerous byproducts of the transition process is surely the overwhelming feeling of lethargy that like a virus is spreading among the people. It runs trough their veins, infecting every possible cell that used to be a piece of a functional unit. And, what once was a fully functional unit, a productive part of a growing society, especially from the economic point of view, now is more alike to the atoms of gases in their natural Brownian movement. Sovereign Wealth Funds – a Potential Tool of Asymmetric Warfare
David J. Jonsson - 8/10/2007
Liberal democracy, led by the United States may have emerged triumphant from the struggles of the 20th century. But the rise of the non-democratic powers of Russia, China and the Islamist states utilizing the combined power of control of energy resources and the growth of Sovereign Wealth Funds (SWF) leaves the liberal democracy’s ultimate victory and future dominance in doubt. Overseas investments by Sovereign Wealth Funds have always had the potential to cause alarm in the destination countries. Because they are driven by governments of the totalitarian and Authoritarian Great Powers, they compel countries to take immediate attention The Poor Nation's Defense Mechanisms
Sam Vaknin, Ph.D. - 7/14/2007
All the countries in the mutilated post-Communist parts of Europe inevitably ended up poor. Yet, as opposed to their neighbors, some polities failed to alleviate their misery or ameliorate their dire predicament. The denizens of these states are not only impoverished - they also feel like losers and failures. International Monetary Fund’s Financial Assistance Policies: Pros and Cons
Gina-Marie Cheeseman - 7/8/2007
Created alongside the World Bank in 1944 during a conference in Bretton Woods, New Hampshire, the International Monetary Fund consists of 185 member countries. According to the IMF’s website, it was established “to promote international monetary cooperation, exchange stability, and orderly exchange arrangements; to foster economic growth and high levels of employment; and to provide temporary financial assistance to countries to help ease balance of payments adjustment.” The operations of the IMF involve surveillance, financial assistance, and technical assistance. World Hunger Is Political Rather Than Economic
Bhuwan Thapaliya - 7/5/2007
An American biologist named Paul Ehrlich had predicted in 1969: “The battle to feed humanity is over. In the 1970s hundreds of millions of people will starve to death.” That never happened, but what he wrote and predicted resembled Thomas Malthus’s prediction. Development: The most important challenge facing the modern human race
Bhuwan Thapaliya - 4/26/2007
Development has seen a lot of changes in the last three decades. Vast developments are occurring in the First world while Third world nations are shrinking. This has become a strain on the development. Hence, considering this, the present development statistics of the world needs to be seen in a proper context. Will Doha Make the WTO Irrelevant?
Prof. Peter Morici - 3/1/2007
Rumors abound in Washington that the stalled Doha Round of World Trade Organization negotiations soon will be resurrected. At stake are large cuts in farm aid, manufacturing tariffs and better rules for trade in services. Yet no one should believe that success will do much to reduce America’s huge trade deficit or shore up shaky public trust in free trade policies. Hedging Foreign Exchange Risks
Sam Vaknin, Ph.D. - 2/1/2007
The exchange rate of the Macedonian denar against the major hard currencies of the world has remained stable in the last few years. Because of the IMF restrictions, the local Narodna (Central) Bank does not print money and there are no physical denars in the economy and in the local banks. Questioning Milton Friedman’s Free Market and Freedom
Prof. Pranab Bardhan - 1/30/2007
Not only democracies but dictators and authoritarian governments pursue the benefits of economic freedom. The recent passing of Chilean dictator Augusto Pinochet and the Nobel laureate economist Milton Friedman provokes economist Pranab Bardhan to reflect on the connections that these two individuals represented: political control and economic freedom. Friedman and other economists have long argued that economic freedom is a necessary foundation for political freedom, but Bardhan questions whether economic freedom is a sufficient condition for advancing political freedom. The painful birth of ... GDP progress is about the mind set
Iqbal Latif - 1/29/2007
My recent trip to Pakistan and the Middle East was an eye-opener. Most of the top economists I came across are totally entrenched in the gridlock of the old economy. Repression and preoccupation with ideological Puritanism has a direct impact on GDP growth. Economic development is the expansion of human choice, i.e. freedom and capability to do what we want. Closed disconnected minds and insular instincts destroy societies. The recent spurt of growth in the economy, evidenced by numerous at-work tower cranes and flurry of construction activity from the slums of Karachi to downtown UAE or Jedda... The Shadowy World of International Finance
Sam Vaknin, Ph.D. - 1/3/2007
Strange, penumbral, characters roam the boardrooms of banks in the countries in transition. Some of them pop apparently from nowhere, others are very well connected and equipped with the most excellent introductions. They all peddle financial transactions which are too good to be true and often are. In the unctuously perfumed propinquity of their Mercedesed, Rolex waving entourage - the polydipsic natives dissolve in their irresistible charm and the temptations of the cash: mountainous returns on capital, effulgent profits, no collaterals, track record, or business plan required. Total security is cloyingly assured. Time has come for the World Bank to mould a new development model
Bhuwan Thapaliya - 12/26/2006
A World Bank study of evaluation in 2000 began with the confession "Despite the billions of dollars spend on development assistance each year, there is still very little known about the actual impact of projects on the poor." The reality is harsh and of course, there has to be incentives to do something as a result of the evaluation but anecdotally, the World Bank hasn’t noticed the differences. But why would it? Its development business has been blossoming all over the world. And we wonder why economic growth benefits only a small portion of the population and may in fact result in increasingly desperate circumstances for the majority. Postcard From Singapore - The Meeting of World Bank and IMF
Sameer Dossani - 10/31/2006
It's 2 a.m. on a Saturday night. I'm in a Singapore police station. No, this story doesn't involve alcohol. Fortunately neither the death penalty nor caning is likely. World Bank Shuts Out Dissident Voices
Peter Bosshard - 10/10/2006
To the bankers and government officials who descended on the city state for the World Bank and International Monetary Fund annual meetings in September, Singapore may have looked like the perfect model of a globalized consumer society. Tellingly, for the first time, the annual meetings took place inside a giant shopping mall. Corporate logos dominated the venue, shoppers went happily about fulfilling their consumer duties, and the delegates were shrouded in a constant cloud of Muzak. Development Requires Local Empowerment
Leif Brottem - 10/4/2006
A 5% economic growth rate has done little for Mozambique's vast poverty stricken population. And although the world's poorest countries have recently enjoyed their highest growth rates in two decades, the growth is fragile and not necessarily improving human well-being. These are some of the findings in the recently released United Nations Conference on Trade and Development (UNCTAD) Least Developed Countries Report. Food Aid or Band-aid?
John Rivera and Conn Hallinan - 9/7/2006
FPIF invited Conn Hallinan and John Rivera to debate the issue of food aid. Hallinan, the author of the FPIF piece "The Devil's Brew of Poverty Relief," has been critical of the relationship between the food aid community and commercial interests. Rivera, a former reporter and editor at the Baltimore Sun, is a senior writer at Catholic Relief Services, where he works closely with his food aid colleagues. Microsoft's Third Front
Sam Vaknin, Ph.D. - 8/23/2006
Elated investors greeted chairman Bill Gates and chief executive officer Steve Ballmer for Microsoft's victory in the titanic antitrust lawsuit brought against it by the Department of Justice and assorted state attorneys general. They also demanded that Microsoft distribute its pile of cash - $40 billion in monopoly profits - as dividends. Microsoft duly complied this year (2006). Will the world starve in the 21st century?
Bhuwan Thapaliya - 8/23/2006
In the 20th century, many people worried there would be a world food crisis in the early 21st century as the unstoppable surge in population overwhelmed mankind's ability to produce food, which was nearing a natural ceiling. And now, the range of longer run concerns is even greater than it was. Worries unknown in the past have appeared. Global warming threatens to render once productive lands desolate. Scientists, in their quest for higher yielding crops, are using genetic engineering, a science which many believe to be dangerous. When Labor Loses Out to Trade
Prof. Gustav Ranis and David Corderi - 8/11/2006
International trade raises the standard of living for most people in any country, but inevitably results in a loss of jobs for a few. The challenge for governments is identifying and implementing policies that support readjustment of those few workers at a reasonable cost. International trade accounted for about 4 percent of layoffs in Canada, the US and the EU in 2000, according to the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development (OECD). Nations react to such layoffs with a range of policies: minimal state intervention and a flexible labor market, as found in the US; ample public sup... The Debacle of Doha
Prof. Walden Bello - 7/30/2006
Several guilty parties were responsible for the recent collapse of the Doha round of trade negotiations, but none guiltier than the United States. U.S. Trade Representative Susan Schwab refused to make a serious offer on cutting domestic subsidies for U.S. farmers. Worse, at a late stage in the negotiations, she appeared determined to eliminate any protection for developing country farmers. The WTO's December 2005 Hong Kong Declaration designated “special products” for exemption from tariff cuts, and Schwab singled out these provisions for attack. Failure of the Doha Round
Edward Gresser - 7/29/2006
Leaders of developing nations anticipated that negotiations of the Doha Round could lead to even-handed trade practices, particularly in agriculture. With the talks collapsed, the wealthiest nations will not suffer nearly as much as the developing nations, according to trade analyst Edward Gresser. The real losers, he says, will be cotton farmers in West Africa, textile workers in low-income Asian and Muslim states, and low-income shoppers in the poorest quarters of America and Europe. Previous international trade agreements on manufacturing and services provided substantial economic wealth fo... Employment and Unemployment - Part V
Sam Vaknin, Ph.D. - 7/21/2006
IIIe. Administrative Measures: Early Retirement A favorite of post-communist countries in transition, early retirement was liberally applied in order to get rid of "technologically-redundant" workers and thus trim under-employment. Employment and Unemployment - Part IV
Sam Vaknin, Ph.D. - 7/20/2006
III. The Solutions IIIa. Tweaking Unemployment Benefits Unemployment benefits provide a strong disincentive to work and, if too generous, may become self-perpetuating. Ideally, unemployment benefits should be means tested and limited in time, should decrease gradually and should be withheld from school dropouts, those who never held a job, and, arguably, as is the case in some countries, women after childbearing. In the USA, unemployment benefits are not available to farm workers, domestic servants, the briefly employed, government workers and the self- employed. Employment and Unemployment - Part III
Sam Vaknin, Ph.D. - 7/19/2006
IIf. Unemployment and Inflation Another common misperception is that there is some trade off between unemployment and inflation. Both Friedman and Phelps attacked this simplistic notion. Unemployment seems to have a "natural" (equilibrium) rate, which is determined by the structure and operation of the labour market and is consistent with stable inflation (NAIRU - Non Accelerating Inflation Rate of Unemployment). Employment and Unemployment - Part II
Sam Vaknin, Ph.D. - 7/18/2006
II. The Facts IIa. Labour Mobility "Mobility", "globalization", "flextime" - media imagery leads us to believe that we move around more often, and change (less secure) jobs more frequently. It is not so. By many measures, the world is less globalized today than it was a century ago. Contrary to popular perceptions, job tenure (in the first 8 years of employment) has not declined, nor did labour mobility increase (according to findings published by the NBER and CEPR). Firms' hiring and firing practices are more flexible but this is because "sarariman" jobs are out of fashion and many worker... Employment and Unemployment - Part I
Sam Vaknin, Ph.D. - 7/17/2006
Communism abolished official unemployment. It had no place in the dictatorship of the proletariat, where all means of production were commonly owned. Underemployment was rife, though. Many workers did little else besides punching cards on their way in and out. Academia For Sale
Sam Vaknin, Ph.D. - 12/17/2005
Mira Markovic is an "Honorary Academic" of the Russian Academy of Science. It cost a lot of money to obtain this title and the Serb multi-billionnaire Karic was only too glad to cough it up. Whatever else you say about Balkan cronies, they rarely bite the hand that feeds them (unless and until it is expedient to do so). And whatever else you say about Russia, it adapted remarkably to capitalism. Everything has a price and a market. Israel had to learn this fact the hard way when Russian practical-nurse-level medical doctors and construction-worker-level civil engineers flooded its shores. Everything is for sale in this region of opportunities, instant education inclusive. Economic Revolutions and Symbols
Sam Vaknin, Ph.D. - 12/11/2005
Five thousand years ago, people were still roaming the earth as nomads. They carried along their few precious possessions in their hands and on their backs. They hunted and gathered food at random. Being First, Being Original, Being Innovative
Sam Vaknin, Ph.D. - 12/8/2005
There is an often missed distinction between Being the First, Being Original, and Being Innovative. Danger - Banks Ahead!
Sam Vaknin, Ph.D. - 12/7/2005
Banks are the most unsafe institutions in the world. Worldwide, hundreds of them crash every few years. Two decades ago, the US Government was forced to invest hundreds of billions of Dollars in the Savings and Loans industry. Multi-billion dollar embezzlement schemes were unearthed in the much feted BCCI - wiping both equity capital and deposits. Barings bank - having weathered 330 years of tumultuous European history - succumbed to a bout of untrammeled speculation by a rogue trader. In 1890 it faced the very same predicament only to be salvaged by other British banks, including the Bank of England. The list is interminable. There were more than 30 major banking crises this century alone. Slush Funds
Sam Vaknin, Ph.D. - 11/27/2005
According to David McClintick ("Swordfish: A True Story of Ambition, Savagery, and Betrayal"), in the late 1980's, the FBI and DEA set up dummy corporations to deal in drugs. They funneled into these corporate fronts money from drug-related asset seizures. Financial Investor, Strategic Investor
Sam Vaknin, Ph.D. - 11/26/2005
In the not so distant past, there was little difference between financial and strategic investors. Investors of all colors sought to safeguard their investment by taking over as many management functions as they could. Additionally, investments were small and shareholders few. A firm resembled a household and the number of people involved – in ownership and in management – was correspondingly limited. People invested in industries they were acquainted with first hand. The Blessings of the Black Economy
Sam Vaknin, Ph.D. - 11/20/2005
Some call it the "unofficial" or "informal" economy, others call it the "grey economy" but the old name fits it best: the "black economy". In the USA "black" means "profitable, healthy" and this is what the black economy is. Macedonia should count its blessings for having had a black economy so strong and thriving to see it through the transition. If Macedonia had to rely only on its official economy it would have gone bankrupt long ago. The IMF Deconstructed: A Dialogue Between Tom Rodwell and Sam Vaknin, December 1998
Sam Vaknin, Ph.D. - 11/6/2005
The following is a standard IMF document, taken from its own website. Underlined phrases are related to categories A and / or B (see below). The phrases here are general examples as part of general criticism of the ideological tone and "aesthetic" of the IMF. This dialogue is a combination of philosophy and economics: does / can the IMF (or any organization) "facilitate the expansion and balanced growth of international trade"? IMF: Kill or Cure?
Sam Vaknin, Ph.D. - 11/4/2005
IMF - Kill or Cure. This was the title of the cover page of the prestigious magazine, "The Economist" in its issue of 10/1/98. The more involved the IMF gets in the world economy - the more controversy surrounds it. Economies in transition, emerging economies, developing countries and, lately, even Asian Tigers all feel the brunt of the IMF recipes. All are not too happy with it, all are loudly complaining. Some economists regard this as a sign of the proper functioning of the International Monetary Fund (IMF) - others spot some justice in some of the complaints. The Prices of Oil
Sam Vaknin, Ph.D. - 6/7/2005
How is the price of oil determined and how important it is to the global economy? Sell the Gold, Free the Poor
Russell Mokhiber and Robert Weissman - 6/7/2005
When historians look back over the past 25 years, one of the great crimes they will identify is the Third World debt crisis. Now, finally, the rich countries have agreed to cancel the debts of the poorest countries to the International Monetary Fund (IMF) and World Bank. But they continue to differ over how to do it. It is now clear a compromise agreement among the rich countries over cancellation of IMF debt can only be reached if the sale of IMF gold is a component of the financing package for debt cancellation. Financial Crises, Global Capital Flows and the International Financial Architecture
Sam Vaknin, Ph.D. - 6/1/2005
The upheavals in the world financial markets during the latter part of the 1990s were quelled by the immediate intervention of both international financial institutions (IFIs) such as the IMF and of domestic ones in the developed countries, such as the Federal Reserve in the USA. The danger seemed to have passed. But, subsequent tremors in South Korea, Brazil and Taiwan and mounting imbalances inside the USA (the "twin deficits") and in the international exchange rates system do not augur well. We may face yet another crisis of the same or a larger magnitude. Property Rights in Trasitional Countries
Sam Vaknin, Ph.D. - 5/30/2005
The Kazakh minister of foreign affairs denied vehemently that Kazakhstan would revise contracts it has signed with foreign investors in the heady days of the early 1990's. It was in a meeting on March 26, 2002 with a delegation of nervous businessmen from the USA and it was expected and prudent - if not entirely truthful - of him to say so. He was merely echoing his autocratic president, Nazarbaev, who made the same promises to visiting and anxious State Department officials earlier that month. Governments and Growth
Sam Vaknin, Ph.D. - 5/27/2005
It is a maxim of current economic orthodoxy that governments compete with the private sector on a limited pool of savings. It is considered equally self-evident that the private sector is better, more competent, and more efficient at allocating scarce economic resources and thus at preventing waste. It is therefore thought economically sound to reduce the size of government - i.e., minimize its tax intake and its public borrowing - in order to free resources for the private sector to allocate productively and efficiently. Economics - Psychology's Neglected Branch
Sam Vaknin, Ph.D. - 5/26/2005
"It is impossible to describe any human action if one does not refer to the meaning the actor sees in the stimulus as well as in the end his response is aiming at."
Ludwig von Mises Economics - to the great dismay of economists - is merely a branch of psychology. It deals with individual behaviour and with mass behaviour. Many of its practitioners sought to disguise its nature as a social science by applying complex mathematics where common sense and direct experimentation would have yielded far better results. Immortality and Mortality in the Economic Sciences
Sam Vaknin, Ph.D. - 5/26/2005
The noted economist, Julian Simon, once quipped: "Because we can expect future generations to be richer than we are, no matter what we do about resources, asking us to refrain from using resources now so that future generations can have them later is like asking the poor to make gifts to the rich." The Emerging Water Wars
Sam Vaknin, Ph.D. - 5/20/2005
Growing up in Israel in the 1960's, we were always urged to conserve precious water. Rainfall was rare and meager, the sun scorching, our only sweet water lake under constant threat by the Syrians. Israelis were being shot at hauling water cisterns or irrigating their parched fields. Water was a matter of life and death - literally. The Bursting Asset Bubbles - Britain's Real Estate
Sam Vaknin, Ph.D. - 4/26/2005
The five ghastly "Jack the Ripper" murders took place in an area less than a quarter square mile in size. Houses in this haunting and decrepit no man's land straddling the City and metropolitan London could be had for 25-50,000 British pounds as late as a decade ago. How things change! The Bursting Asset Bubbles - The Savings and Loans Associations Bailout
Sam Vaknin, Ph.D. - 4/24/2005
Asset bubbles - in the stock exchange, in the real estate or the commodity markets - invariably burst and often lead to banking crises. One such calamity struck the USA in 1986-1989. It is instructive to study the decisive reaction of the administration and Congress alike. They tackled both the ensuing liquidity crunch and the structural flaws exposed by the crisis with tenacity and skill. Compare this to the lackluster and hesitant tentativeness of the current lot. True, the crisis - the result of a speculative bubble - concerned the banking and real estate markets rather than the capital markets. But the similarities are there. The Bursting Asset Bubbles - Introduction (Part 1)
Sam Vaknin, Ph.D. - 4/22/2005
The recent implosion of the global equity markets in 1999-2002 - from Hong Kong to New York - engendered yet another round of the semipiternal debate: should central banks contemplate abrupt adjustments in the prices of assets - such as stocks or real estate - as they do changes in the consumer price indices? Are asset bubbles indeed inflationary and their bursting deflationary? The Bankrupt Sovereign
Sam Vaknin, Ph.D. - 4/19/2005
In a little noticed speech, given in January 2003 at an IMF conference in Washington, Glenn Hubbard, then Chairman of President Bush's Council of Economic Advisers, delineated a compromise between the United States and the International Monetary Fund regarding a much mooted proposal to allow countries to go bankrupt. In a rehash of ideas put forth by John Taylor, then Treasury Undersecretary for International Affairs, Hubbard proposed to modify all sovereign debt contracts pertaining to all forms of debt to allow for majority decision making, the pro-rata sharing of disproportionate payments r... The Washington Consensus and The International Monetary Fund
Sam Vaknin, Ph.D. - 4/18/2005
In an interview he granted on April 14, 2005 to the Washington File, produced by the Bureau of International Information Programs, U.S. Department of State, John Taylor, outgoing Under Secretary of the Treasury outlined the Bush administration's vision for the International Monetary Fund (IMF). The IMF, he said, "assess the economic policies of countries that do not need the fund's resources ... (This) would allow the IMF to signal its approval or disapproval of, and provide markets with a clearer view of a country's economic policies ... (Other reforms would be) the inclusion of collective ac... Failure of IMF and World Bank in Fmr USSR: Uncommon Poverty of the Commonwealth
Sam Vaknin, Ph.D. - 3/6/2005
The Lucerne Conference on the 9 months old CIS-7 Initiative ended two years ago with yet another misguided call upon charity-weary donors to grant the poorest seven countries (Armenia, Azerbaijan, Georgia, Kyrgyz Republic, Moldova, Tajikistan, and Uzbekistan) of the Commonwealth of Independent States financial assistance in the form of grants rather than credits.
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