The Political Morality of the International Monetary Fund

Not all the contributors write about moral issues. Those who do are mostly concerned with equity, human rights, political responsibility and the burden of austerity on the poor. Other papers, however, touch on fundamental ethical issues when they raise questions about what alternatives there are to the conditions the IMF lays down for debtors; the possibility that Fund prescriptions are not only arrogant but incorrect; whether a narrow focus may contribute to better overall results than could be achieved by explicitly pursuing "political morality"; and whether it is to the Fund or to member governments that moral judgments should apply.