Increasing attention is being paid to political economy dimensions of the IMF's operations. However, up until now, the literature has lacked a systematic overview of how politics and economics interact in this context. This paper sets out to fill the gap. Its conceptual basis is that of the...

IMF programmes have sought to balance economic adjustment and external financing in part by relying on catalysing capital inflows from other sources. This paper reviews the mechanisms by which catalysis is believed to operate, and the evidence pertaining to its existence. The conclusion is that...

In a 2005 article in this journal, Genberg poses the question of whether countries with IMF programs have “privileged access” to international capital markets. In attempting to answer this question, he cautions about reading too much into some of the recent literature. In this paper, we...

In seeking to understand IMF lending early large sample econometric studies tended to focus on economic factors. Political and institutional influences were often deemed to be reflected in the frequently large residual. At the same time increasing anecdotal evidence was being amassed to suggest...