Deeper than Debt

An introduction to the history and current implications of the debt crisis, which positions debt in the wider context of globalisation and development. Deeper than Debt brings together a wide range of viewpoints to discuss the effects of economic globalisation on the lives of the poor majority in debtor countries. This primer text argues that, due to debt, four fifths of the world's population cannot develop while inequality between the rich and the poor grows. This book provides invaluable analysis for activists who have campaigned successfully with Jubilee 2000 and other campaigns, and for those wanting a deeper look at development and economic issues raised by international debt. Debt is a good thing - for creditors. In the current global economy, the debt owed by the poorest countries allows the richest to have enormous infl uence over most Southern economies. Such control is enforced via the International Monetary Fund, which requires poor countries to export raw materials at low prices, cut back on social spending on areas such as health and education, and to privatise national wealth - all to generate dollars to pay rich creditors. Debt means four fi fths of the world 's population cannot develop, while inequality between the rich and poor grows. Deeper than Debt brings together a wide range of arguments and views to examine the effects of economic globalisation on the lives of the poor majority in debtor countries, and how debt can illuminate the process of the ever-deepening inequality between rich and poor. Deeper than Debt will provide invaluable analysis for debt activists who have campaigned successfully with Jubilee 2000 and for those wanting a deeper look at the development and economic issues raised by debt. George Ann Potter is an economic anthropologist with 20 years' experience of development management and policy work. She lives and works in Bolivia where she is involved in the Jubilee 2000 campaign. She has written extensively on debt. including a book, Dialogue on Debt ( 1988).