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Normalizing pathologies of difference : the discursive function of IMF conditionality

This thesis aims to complicate conventional understandings of the way in which the
"conditionally" of the International Monetary Fund operates in relation to North/South
relations.
Part One is comprised of three sections. The first section is a brief introduction to the
context of the project, namely the need to re-examine the contemporary roles of
international economic institutions in what is perceived to be a globalizing economic
environment. The second section provides an outline of the methodologies being used
in the paper. In this regard, the author will explain the need to compile a historical
genealogy of the legal development of Fund conditionality vis a vis the South, and
describe the interdisciplinary approaches to discourse analysis taken in the paper. The
third section briefly sets out the origins of the International Monetary Fund and
provides a background to the Fund's conditionality.
Part Two is a detailed account, or historical genealogy, of the way in which the IMF
became involved in the business of lending to the South. This account is directed at
tracing the transformation of the Fund through what the author considers to be three
major developments in the evolution of Fund conditionality. The transformation which
the author argues took place was a transformation of the role of the Fund from an
institution concerned primarily with managing monetary institutions between
industrialised nations to a surveillance organisation directed at providing information
about the Third World to the First World.
Part Three takes the idea of the contemporary role of the Fund as a surveillance
organisation revealed in the preceding section and explores what discursive functions
the Fund might be performing in the context of the relationship between North and
South. In this regard the author identifies two major themes underlying IMF discourse
about the Third World both of which suggest that an underlying sense of danger of the
Third World is felt by the First World, and that this sense of danger replicates older
fears. The author then examines the discursive practices employed to address these
fears and the extent to which they too resonate with older discursive strategies. The
author then considers why the reoccurrence of these older discursive technologies might
be problematic.
Part Four provides some closing comments about the insights gained from the
preceding analysis. In doing so, it offers a tentative suggestion for how we might
productively disrupt the colonial continuum of which the discursive practices described
above seem to form part. / Law, Peter A. Allard School of / Graduate

Identiferoai:union.ndltd.org:UBC/oai:circle.library.ubc.ca:2429/9761
Date11 1900
CreatorsPahuja, Sundhya
Source SetsUniversity of British Columbia
LanguageEnglish
Detected LanguageEnglish
TypeText, Thesis/Dissertation
Format5679063 bytes, application/pdf
RightsFor non-commercial purposes only, such as research, private study and education. Additional conditions apply, see Terms of Use https://open.library.ubc.ca/terms_of_use.

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