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Periodical article Periodical article Leiden University catalogue Leiden University catalogue WorldCat catalogue WorldCat
Title:Reconsidering the Power of the IFIs: Tanzania and the World Bank, 1978-1985
Author:Holtom, DuncanISNI
Year:2005
Periodical:Review of African Political Economy
Volume:32
Issue:106
Period:December
Pages:549-567
Language:English
Geographic term:Tanzania
Subjects:economic policy
World Bank
IMF
1980-1989
Development and Technology
Economics and Trade
international relations
Politics and Government
History and Exploration
Abbreviation:IFIs=International Financial Institutions
External link:https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/abs/10.1080/03056240500467054
Abstract:The capitulation of the Tanzanian government in 1985 to the demands of the IMF and the World Bank to implement a structural adjustment programme (SAP) stands as a landmark in relations between the Bank, IMF and sub-Saharan African States. After six years of bitter struggle, Nyerere's Tanzania, leader of the non-aligned movement and standard bearer of African socialism, had given into the demands of international capitalism. This paper examines why the Tanzanian government resisted neoliberal policies promoted by the Bank and IMF for six years before acceding to them in 1985. As an aid-dependent country, the ability of the Bank and IMF to mobilize and withhold aid was a decisive factor. Nevertheless, this does not explain why Nyerere drove the country right to the very brink of collapse, before turning back. The paper argues that the discourses within the Bank and the Tanzanian government came to circumscribe the realm of 'rational' policy, and therefore their ability to compromise. By drawing upon the work of Peter Hall (1993), the paper examines how discursive change within the government that could have allowed agreement to be reached in 1979, was blocked. Bibliogr., notes, ref. sum. [ASC Leiden abstract]
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