IMF and other global institutions is the problem of governance: who decides what
they do and how they do it.
MEIs like the IMF, WTO, and World Bank have come under increasing
pressure from criticism by a coalition of civil society networks with regard to their
decision-making process and operations, and they have begun to engage elements of
what they “define” as civil society. These attempts have, with more or less success
and sincerity, resulted in limited partnerships at least at the level of advertized
programs at these institutions.
Increasingly vocal and concerted criticism that fostered real and imagined
attempts at dialogue can be reviewed in the framework of a general mistrust of
organizations that operate in a culture of secrecy, and who are viewed as having
destabilized and undermined economic development in developing countries for
decades. Their lack of transparency and exclusionary decision-making processes,
and the human and social costs of their implemented programs erupted in violent
and unprecedented protests against these institutions – unprecedented because of the
cross-issue, transnational character of civil society’s response. The message to the
WTO by the Seattle to Brussels Network (a pan-European network of 99
associations), for example, was “Shrink or Sink!”
The WTO, in its Marrakesh Agreement, provides the potential for relationships
with NGOs in Article V (2):
The General Council may make appropriate arrangements for
consultation and co-operation with non-governmental organisations
concerned with matters related to those of the WTO.
Caveats were made, however, in the guidelines adopted by the General Council
of the WTO that state:
… there is currently a broadly held view that it would not be possible for
NGOs to be directly involved in the work of the WTO or its meetings.
Closer consultation and cooperation with NGOs can also be met
constructively through appropriate processes at the national level where
lies primary responsibility for taking into account the different elements
of public interest which are brought to bear on trade policy-making.
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