The PRSP Initiative: Old Wine in New Bottles?

At the end of the last decade, three factors forced the World Bank and the International Monetary Fund (IMF) to change their attitude and to seek a renewal of their approaches and practices in the developing countries. The first reason was the acute awareness of the increase of the poverty incidence in many parts of the world. The second one was related to the failure in most countries of structural adjustment policies and the questioning of the Washington Consensus on which they are based. The third factor was the crisis in legitimacy of the Bretton Woods Institutions (BWIs) who had to answer the rising criticisms from civil society and various protest movements. As a result, a joint Initiative launched by the BWIs at the end of 1999 sets the fight against poverty at the heart of development policies. Under this Initiative, low-income countries wishing to apply for financial aid from either of the organisations, or for debt relief under the HIPC (Heavily Indebted Poor Countries) Initiative, are required to draw up poverty re duction programs known as Poverty Reduction Strategy Papers (PRSPs). Since then, the BWIs have mobilised considerable human and financial resources to implement the Initiative and to ensure its success. All the other donors rapidly decided to follow suit and link their aid policies to the PRSP Initiative. Just two years after it was launched, the new poverty reduction programs now channel all officia