CADTM - en

An exceptionally interesting debate about how imperialism is now behaving.
Two leading critics of imperialism – John Smith and David Harvey – have recently fought bitterly at the Review of African Political Economy website (http://roape.net) over how to interpret geographically-shifting processes of super-exploitation.
The risk is that they obscure crucial features of their joint wrath: the unjust accumulation processes and geopolitics that enrich the wealthy and despoil the world (...)

Contrary to what is often claimed, microcredits are not a way out of poverty; on the contrary they most often result in a greater deprivation and humiliation of their victims. On the Indian sub-continent 65 million people have taken on a microcredit, 90% are women. Worldwide, women count for 81% of microcredit users (112 million).
After an enquiry among microcredit victims and militants acting in their defence, we present here some emblematic cases. We point out that we have been unable to (...)

The recent self-immolation of a family in Tamil Nadu drew widespread attention to the issue of usury prevalent in the state. Following a hearing on the depositions of 60 borrower victims at a people's tribunal in Tirunelveli district, an attempt has been made to examine the nature of the issue, profile the borrower victims, the perpetrators, government apathy and the failure of law enforcement.
The term “usury” implies lending money at an exorbitant rate of interest. It is an age-old (...)

Tigran Kalaydjian explains the booming debt crisis - and what it means for the global economy.
In an era when calculations in the trillions are commonplace, a figure that hasn't yet been heard regularly is “quadrillion,” but that may be about to change. As total global debt continues its inexorable and menacing rise, surpassing $233 trillion in Q3 of 2017, it is projected to hit a quarter of a quadrillion dollars sometime next year. For those not sure what it means, quadrillion is 1 followed (...)

The number of poor countries facing major debt crises has doubled since 2013, and only 1 in 5 are now considered to be at low risk of crisis. With some countries in the midst of crisis and others on the brink, meeting the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) remains a pipe dream, writes Mark Perera.
The debt burden of developing countries has been rising fast, both in absolute terms, and in relation to economic indicators such as GDP, export earnings, and government revenue – trends are (...)

Emmanuel Elong, the farmer who came from Cameroon specifically for the lawsuit filed by the Bolloré group against France 2, tells of the psychological pressure you are under when you confront a major group in Africa.
Emmanuel Elong is an independent grower in Cameroon. His village lies within the Socapalm plantation in which the Bolloré group has a stake. He is also the chair of the Synergie Nationale des Paysans et Riverains du Cameroun (Synaparcam). On 3 April, he was present at the (...)

The $1.77 billion Punjab National Bank (PNB) scam, possibly the biggest financial chicanery to have hit the Indian banking sector, is rocking the nation. Perpetrated by a diamond tycoon in collusion with bank officials, defrauding India's second largest bank in such a manner seems astonishing. Especially after repeated claims by regulatory and governmental agencies of a heightened scrutiny of public sector banks' operations to safeguard public assets.
Billionaires and public funds
It is a (...)

Regulators, governments to blame, says Eric Toussaint of the Committee for the Abolition of Illegitimate Debt.
The recent bubbles in the stock exchanges and financial markets foretell an imminent financial crisis that would likely be stronger and more dangerous than in the past, according to Eric Toussaint, historian, political scientist and a spokesman of the Committee for the Abolition of Illegitimate Debt (CADTM).
In an interview to The Hindu, Mr. Toussaint, who was recently in Sri (...)

We, the participants of the 7th CADTM South Asia workshop from Bangladesh, Nepal, India, Pakistan, Sri Lanka, Japan as well as from Belgium and France gathered at Colombo, Sri Lanka from 6-8 April 2018 acknowledge and affirm that illegitimate debt is a mechanism used to transfer wealth created by toilers to the benefit of capitalists and other exploiting classes. We also declare that public debt (both external and internal) involves a massive transfer of wealth from the peoples of the South (...)

The seventh CADTM South Asia regional workshop was successfully held in Colombo (Sri Lanka) from April 6 to April 8, 2018, with participants from Sri Lanka, but also from India, Pakistan, Bangladesh, Nepal, as well as from Japan, France and Belgium (for the CADTM International Secretariat). Around forty delegates, most of them being representatives of social movements (peasants' movements, feminism, trade unionism, etc.), came together for this three-day long programme. This workshop was not (...)

The seventh CADTM South Asia regional workshop was successfully held in Colombo (Sri Lanka) from April 6 to April 8, 2018, with participants coming from Sri Lanka, India, Pakistan, Bangladesh, Nepal, Japan, Belgium and France. Around forty delegates, most of them being representatives of social movements (peasants' movements, feminism, trade unionism, etc.), came together for this three-day long programme. Different topics were discussed during the meeting, such as the public debt policies (...)

The Great Recession, from the middle of 2007 onwards, has rocked the global economy. This has led to at least a couple of things. The legitimacy of neoliberalism in the west—qua ‘there is no other alternative'—has been shattered, and vast majority of people are now looking for other political alternatives which partly explains the rise of the popularity of Bernie Sanders in the US and Jeremy Corbyn in the UK. This has also laid bare the inability of mainstream economics to explain, let alone (...)

• Pakistan will have to payback $100 billion to China by 2024 of total investment of $18.5 billion, which China has invested on account of bank loans in 19 early harvest projects, under CPEC. • China has become the biggest lender to Pakistan after surpassing Japan. Pakistan owes $19 billion (1/5 of its total debt) to China. The CPEC loans will add $14 billion to Pakistan's total public debt, raising it to $90 billion by June 2019, abating Pakistan's economic ability to service huge amount of (...)

In recent years, the World Bank and IMF have played an influential role in shaping national social protection policies. Social protection comprises a significant share of World Bank loans, reaching almost 10 per cent of lending to low-income countries in 2017, while around 10 per cent of IMF loans include conditionality linked to social protection. While the institutions collaborate closely on social protection, there are serious shortcomings of the approach of both institutions to the (...)

The World Bank decided last year to devote the 2019 edition of its flagship annual policy review publication, the World Development Report, to the theme of the future of work. Preparation of the WDR 2019 encountered some delay after the ouster in late January of the report's first director, the Bank's chief economist Paul Romer. However, he was promptly replaced by Simeon Djankov, who was the founding director of Doing Business while working at the World Bank from 1995-2009 and subsequently (...)

The seventh CADTM South Asia regional workshop was successfully held in Colombo (Sri Lanka) from April 6 to April 8, 2018, with participants coming from Sri Lanka, India, Pakistan, Bangladesh, Nepal, Japan, Belgium and France. Around forty delegates, most of them being representatives of social movements (peasants' movements, feminism, trade unionism, etc.), came together for this three-day long programme. Different topics were discussed during the meeting, such as the public debt policies (...)

Microcredit is nothing more than a socially validated way for financial elites to exploit the poor.
hirty years ago the international development community was ecstatic. It had found the perfect market-affirming solution to poverty in developing countries: microcredit.
The popularizer of this new strategy — which consisted of providing small loans to the poor so they could launch self-employment ventures — was the US-trained Bangladeshi economist Muhammad Yunus, who portrayed microcredit as (...)

World Bank Group (WBG) President Jim Yong Kim announced at December's One Planet Summit in Paris that the Bank will cease project lending for ‘upstream' oil and gas projects after 2019. SUMMARY
WBG announced it will end finance for ‘upstream' oil and gas projects after 2019
Pledge includes exception for gas projects in low-income countries
CSOs push Bank to phase out other fossil fuel lending
World Bank Group (WBG) President Jim Yong Kim announced at December's One Planet Summit in (...)

“I signed the formal letter of request and, with revulsion in my stomach, had it sent to the creditors. It was a thing of darkness. And I had acknowledged it as mine.” [1]
Varoufakis
Disclaimer: This series of articles on Yanis Varoufakis's book, Adults in The Room: My Battle With Europe's Deep Establishment is a guide for left-leaning readers who are not happy with the dominant narrative meted out by the mainstream media and the Troika-controlled governments. These readers are also (...)

On the 11th of April, 2017, at the end of its report , the OECD proudly announced an increase in official development assistance for the past year: “In 2016, net official development assistance ODA) of the member countries of the Development Assistance Committee (DAC) OECD reached a new high of USD 142.6 billion. This represents an increase of 8.9% compared to 2015, taking into account exchange rates and inflation rates. Net ODA also increased as a percentage of gross national income (GNI) (...)