Panel debates IMF involvement

Last year, the members of Penn Students Against Sweatshops made a name for themselves by staging a nine-day sit-in inside College Hall. This year, they've joined forces with PennForum to sponsor a quieter means of social awareness -- in the form of a debate. On Thursday night, PSAS, in conjunction with PennForum, sponsored a panel discussion about the International Monetary Fund and the World Bank -- two institutions that sparked worldwide controversy last year. PennForum organized the debate partly to coincide with protests in Prague last week, which blockaded IMF and World Bank officials in their hotel rooms. The protesters believe that global lending agencies harm the poor. The panel consisted of Economics graduate student Protima Advani, Political Science Professor Thomas Callaghy, Political Science graduate student Mike Janson and Richard Erstad, the director of Latin American and Caribbean Programs for the American Friends Service Committee. During the 1 1/2 hour discussion, the panelists had the chance to respond to various open-ended questions. One of the first issues discussed was how an outside country goes about assessing what is best for another struggling nation. Using this issue as a springboard for discussion, Advani urged the IMF and World Bank to stop the cycle of politics and special interests. "Money should be given to special groups who understand what the people need, not the man in power," Advani said. She said she believes that giving from the top down only perpetuates a cycle of corruption and enhances the gap between the rich and the poor. Advani argued that the debt of developing countries should be forgiven in order to allow them to forget their pasts and forge ahead. "Developing countries are hanging on the outside, paying their debt instead of planning for the future," she added. Janson then labeled the economy as "fundamentally political." He asserted that the IMF does not want to create self-sufficient countries, but rather, an economy of exporters. Janson said "a paradigm shift" for development must occur so that debts can be repaid. He said those who run the IMF do not know the best way to deal with the debt issue, nor can they follow the illusion of a set recipe. Janson proposed that the debts of those countries that were colonized by European nations should be eliminated and, furthermore, the colonizing countries should be charged. College sophomore Lincoln Ellis, a member of PSAS who helped organize the event, said, "For our own edification, we wanted to show the student body that this generation of activists is not only about protesting." Added College junior Linda Oh: "We're here at this UPenn magic-land, and we have no idea what is going on in third-world countries." Other events this week included a PSAS teach-in on Monday. A scheduled rally on College Green was canceled because of inclement weather.