Neocolonialism and the World Bank – Janayugom Online

According to recent figures released by the World Bank, the country that borrowed the most from them was China, $2420 million. The next country is India with 1776 million dollars, followed by Indonesia with 1692 million dollars. The IMF, an agency of the World Bank, has 190 member countries. Only seven countries, including Cuba, are absent. The World Bank and its associated agencies work to implement the interlinked economic programs of liberalization, privatization and globalization. At the end of the 1960s, the World Bank formed a credit policy in accordance with these three financial plans in various countries. The early trials were in various Latin American countries including Argentina, one of the 10 richest countries in the world in the 60s, and in Asian countries such as Thailand, Korea, and the Philippines. It is a later history that none of these countries caught on. Today 52 countries are drowning in foreign debt.

The five agencies of the World Bank namely IBRD (International Bank of Reconstruction and Development), IDA (International Development Association), IFC (International Finance Corporation), MIGA (Multilateral Investment Guarantee Agency) and ICSID (International Center Center) are responsible for implementing the goals of globalization, liberalization and privatization for the developed countries. for Settlement of Investment Disputes). There are obvious reasons why the rich countries of the world are trying to achieve the above three goals by establishing the World Bank. Between 1700 and 1940, the leading nations of the day, Britain, Spain, France, Germany, Portugal, and Denmark, all had large colonies in Asia and Africa. Immigrants from these countries also reached the American continent and established countries in South America, mainly from Spain and Portugal, and in North America, mainly from Britain and France. From 1700 to 1947, the wealth that flowed into Britain from India made Britain a never-ending empire. France and Germany established colonies mainly on the African continent. Portugal and Spain were more involved in the slave trade.


Also Read: An economy in decline


But World War I and the subsequent World War II (the main cause of World War I being the growing nationalism in Europe and the other being the competition to gain more control over the colonies) greatly sapped the power of the colonial powers Britain and France. Germany, on the other hand, was completely devastated. The said political and economic environment made these countries unable to continue their rule in the colonies. Even in the colonies, the political struggles for an independent state became very strong. In this situation, Canada, South Africa, Australia and New Zealand became independent from Britain in 1939. But the Commonwealth did not leave. But almost all the colonies gained independence within the mid-1940s to the late 50s. Britain’s largest colony, India became independent on August 15, 1947.

After the colonies gained independence, the developed countries found it difficult to get cheap raw materials for their industries and markets for their products. At the same time, Britain’s supremacy disappeared in world politics due to the obligations caused by the Second World War, and two slums were formed in its place, led by the United States of America and the Soviet Union. The Soviet Union was able to effectively resist the incursion of the western capitalist countries led by the US into the developing countries and to implement development projects in various countries, including India, by raising the standard of living of ordinary people in a socialist model. At the same time, in the event that invasion through colonization is not possible, the Western developed countries led by the US are establishing the World Bank and implementing the policies of liberalization, globalization, and privatization as a strategy to enter the economic sectors of developing countries.
In the new world order created following the disintegration of the Soviet Union, the Western powers, led by the US, were able to go to a unipolar world system, impose privatization and create puppet governments in many countries, impoverishing the poor people in developing countries. From the overthrow of the Allende government in Chile to the execution of a brave fighter named Saddam Hussein for allegedly possessing completely bogus chemical weapons, the West has pursued a policy of aggression.


Also Read: Development, welfare and resource mobilization


Globalization means one, free trade where no national borders apply, be it in resources, labor or capital. Second, the influx of unregulated finance capital. It weakens national economies and undermines local business by encouraging speculation. Third, internationalizing commodity production. Most profitably, it is produced by contract workers in different parts of the world and sold worldwide. All the rights of the workers like job stability and minimum wages are lost. Fourth, it destroys the health and wealth of people by producing harmful products for the sake of profit and selling them all over the world. Examples are beverages such as Coca-Cola and cosmetics.

Fifth, different tastes, culture, language, clothes and art forms are eliminated and common tastes, culture, language and clothes are influenced by advertisements on consumers and the uniqueness of different communities is eliminated.
The sixth and most important point is that the markets of the developing countries are opened to the companies of the rich countries through various international agreements, but the return trade and immigration from the developing countries are strictly prohibited. The experience of countries that have implemented globalization is not at all favorable. The 1997 UNDP report makes this clear. Unemployment, lack of sources of income, lack of public health system, public education system, political instability, lack of security, all these are the effects of globalization in countries. These implications need to be analyzed in detail.

Leave a Replay