The 1988 annual meetings of the International Monetary Fund (IMF) and World Bank were met with an international protest in West Berlin. Whereas the organizations' earlier meetings were met with smaller, national protests, the 1988 meetings attracted protesters internationally against what was the largest assembly of the international monetary order since the 1944 Bretton Woods Conference. Protesters demonstrated against the IMF's austerity policies towards developing nations. Representatives from Third World countries called for debt cancellation, and others advocated for solutions to world hunger and poverty. Due to the protest's high-profile venue, media outlets extensively covered the protests. Later IMF and World Bank meetings received smaller protests, but following the 1999 Seattle WTO protests, all meetings of the IMF, World Bank, G7, and G8 summits were met with significant protests.[1]
References
edit- ^ Peet, Richard (2009). Unholy Trinity: The IMF, World Bank and WTO. Zed Books. pp. 110–111. ISBN 978-1-84813-796-7.
Further reading
edit- Amnesty International (1989). West Berlin: The Anti-IMF/World Bank Protests of September 1988. London: Amnesty International. OCLC 442728621.
- "Big Protest At I.M.F. Site". The New York Times. September 26, 1988. ISSN 0362-4331.
- Gerhards, Jürgen; Rucht, Dieter (November 1, 1992). "Mesomobilization: Organizing and Framing in Two Protest Campaigns in West Germany". American Journal of Sociology. 98 (3): 555–596. doi:10.1086/230049. ISSN 0002-9602. S2CID 143105263.
- "Leftist Rampage in Berlin Has 53 Hurt, 134 Arrested". The Boston Globe. Associated Press. May 3, 1988. Archived from the original on August 11, 2011 – via HighBeam.
- Katsiaficas, George (2006). The Subversion of Politics: European Autonomous Social Movements and the Decolonization of Everyday Life. Oakland: AK Press. ISBN 978-1-904859-53-6. OCLC 176788789.
- Keegan, William (September 24, 2000). "In my view: Oil crisis? What oil crisis?". The Guardian. ISSN 0261-3077.
The 1988 meetings in West Berlin were memorable for the first appearance of protesters: one recalls an orderly procession, followed rapidly by street cleaners picking up rubbish with Teutonic thoroughness.
- Olesen, Thomas (2010). Power and Transnational Activism. Routledge. p. 314. ISBN 978-1-136-86499-5.
- Rich, Bruce (2013). "Greens Lay Siege to the Crystal Palace". Mortgaging the Earth. Island Press, Washington, DC. pp. 107–147. doi:10.5822/978-1-61091-515-1. ISBN 978-1-59726-431-0. S2CID 153626862.
External links
edit- History of the 1988 IMF and World Bank Conference resistance in West Berlin, written by Dissent Network against the 2005 G8 Summit
