A nova face das políticas de desenvolvimento do Banco Mundial: do ajuste estrutural para a boa governança

Abstract

The article proposes a constructivist interpretation of the changes in the World Bank’s strategy for assisting developing countries, focusing on its operations in Latin America. Specifically, the article discusses two approaches regarding the role of the state in development policies: the Structural Adjustment Loans, widely used in the 1980s and 1990s, and the Development Policy Lending (DPL), which is an innovative mechanism to support the Good Governance agenda. The article questions if the Bank is working on a new paradigm to delivery its loans or if it is a new approach to the well-known conditionalities. The main conclusion is that the new face of the Bank’s development policy is a response to the crisis of authority of the Bank to issue directive conditionalities, given the acknowledged failure of adjustment policies and the increasing demand of developing countries for greater ownership. In Latin America, the effect of this new approach has been the concentration of resources approved by the World Bank in the few countries that accept the instructions and commitments regarding Good Governance as rule of behavior prior to the negotiations of loans.