Over two decades, the World Bank has undertaken many structural adjustment operations with governments of developing countries. During negotiations for structural adjustment loans (SALs), partner governments agree to specific policy reforms, whose implementation becomes a condition for...

The authors show that labor market policies and institutions affect the effectiveness of economic reform programs. They compare annual growth rates across 119 countries, using data from 449 World Bank adjustment credits and loans between 1980 and 1996. The results indicate that countries with...

This paper reviews the literature relevant to understanding political constraints to economic reforms. Reform refers to changes in government policies or institutional rules because status quo policies and institutions are not working well to achieve the goals of economic well-being and...

Structural adjustment - as measured by the number of adjustment loans from the IMF, and the World Bank - reduces the growth elasticity of poverty reduction. The author finds no evidence for structural adjustment having a direct effect on growth. The poor benefit less from output expansion in...

This study investigates the impact of World Bank development policy lending on the quality of economic policy. It finds that the quality of policy increases, but at a diminishing rate, with the cumulative number of policy loans. Similar results hold for the cumulative number of conditions...

The author studies the links between macroeconomic adjustment and poverty. First, he summarizes some of the recent evidence on poverty in the developing world. Second, he reviews the various channels through which macroeconomic policies affect the poor. Third, the author emphasizes the role of...

In the 1990s macroeconomic policies improved in a majority of developing countries, but the growth dividend from such improvement fell short of expectations, and a policy agenda focused on stability turned out to be associated with a multiplicity of financial crises. The authors take a...

Economic development critically involves diversification and structural transformation—that is, the continued, dynamic reallocation of resources from less productive to more productive sectors and activities. This paper documents that, over an extended period, developing Asia has on average...

Developing countries made considerable gains during the first decade of the 21st century. Their economies grew at unprecedented rates, resulting in large reduction in extreme poverty and a significant expansion of the middle class. But more recently that progress has slowed with an economic...

Because of politics, some economic policy reforms are adopted and pursued in the developing world, and others are delayed, and resisted. Economic reform is inherently a political act: It changes the distribution of benefits in society, benefiting some social groups, and hurting others. Social...