International EVIL Fund!

I already posted a response like this to my friend on Facebook, but I want to go into a little more detail.

My friend posted an article critical of the International Monetary Fund (IMF). Although most of the criticism is valid, I disagreed with the author’s interpretation of the IMF’s motives. What I got from the article was that the IMF was founded by evil white guys whose only motivation was racism, greed and evilness. First world nations are trying to screw third world nations and keep them down. I think that’s a little over the top. Don’t get me wrong, there are evil organizations in the world; the KKK, Al Qaeda and the Taliban, and the Nazis (historic and modern). So, it is not outside the realm of possibility to have organizations whose motivations are evil. But I don’t think the IMF is one of them.

One of my main problems with this article is this paragraph:

To understand this story, you have to reel back to the birth of the IMF. In 1944, the countries that were poised to win the Second World War gathered in a hotel in rural New Hampshire to divvy up the spoils…They wanted to build a global financial system that ensured they received the lion's share of the planet's money and resources. They set up a series of institutions designed for that purpose – and so the IMF was delivered into the world.

One, the “countries that were poised to win the Second World War” included these nations:

 (Light and Dark Green: Allies. Yellow: Axis. Grey: Neutral.)

Or in other terms, 90% of the world. The article goes on to explain how the IMF has been harming multiple third world nations. Well, according to the article, the IMF was designed by the Allies to harm the non-Allies. Seeing how those third world nations didn’t exist yet and were at the time part of the Allied powers (mostly France and the UK), I don’t see how they were planning to screw them.

“So we the Allies, trying to screw the non-Allies, are going to harm the Allies”. That doesn’t make much sense.

The European colonial powers didn’t see themselves giving up their colonies any time soon (with the possible exception of India, which had a large independence movement dating back decades). Trying to set up an organization to harm countries not yet in existence seemed a little forward thinking for them.

Second, according to the article and its definition of ‘they’ being ‘victors of World War II’, the only nations the IMF were trying to screw were Germany and Japan (and a few minor nations like Bulgaria and Thailand). How did that work out? Oh, Japan and Germany are two of the three largest/most powerful members in the IMF.

It’s things like this that really bug me. Comments like this ruin any legitimacy this article had. If they can’t bother to pick up a book or look online to get their history right, they probably don’t understand this issue or are just heavily biased. Rereading that, I’m still in disbelief of what was said.

With that out of the way, my other problem has to deal with the supposed motivations of the IMF. To me, it looks like the IMF was created to get the World economy back on track after the war. Also, to help nations get on their feet and expand.

According to the author, they are evil.

I don’t think that is fair. Looking at all of the problems listed by the author, it looks like the IMF is incompetent. Like I said to my friend, organizations like this are run by bureaucrats with college degrees with no real world experience. Look at every friggin “Think Tank” in Washington. Six figured idiots with no basis in reality and politicians choose to listen to (and take money from) the ones they want to hear. They stick to some rigid ideology and make their decisions based on what looks good on paper. They don’t know anything about the nations they are trying to help and thus make uninformed decisions that end up hurting those they thought they were helping. The road to Hell is paved with good intentions. They are not evil, they are just incompetent.

With that said, the IMF deserves to be criticized. The author of the article points out many instances in which the IMF made things worse for a country. No matter how much they are trying to help, good intentions are not enough. They need to do more to work with the country they are trying to help to better understand the problem. They have to stop demanding so many conditions and terms in order to help a nation. THEY NEED TO REALIZE PEOPLE NEED FOOD TO EAT!

The problem is when people portray them as some James Bond villain organization. When you talk of evil conspiracies, you turn off most people who want a rational argument. This is why Newt Gingrich can’t be President; he makes up enemies (Gay fascists? Really???) and claims they are this close to destroying everything you hold dear. Yes, criticize the IMF for their bad decisions and demand that they reform. Just don’t turn them into Skynet.