Issue #0

A New Green Order?: The World Bank and the Politics of the Global Environment Facility

the World Bank and the politics of the Global Environment Facility

Plot

The Global Environment Facility (GEF) is a publicly funded, multi-billion dollar experiment in global resource management. It was set up in 1991 under the auspices of the World Bank to fund international conventions on climate change and biodiversity. Investigating the workings of this little known aid fund, Zoe Young takes a critical look at the conflicts involved, focusing on how the GEF's agenda relates to questions of globalisation, knowledge and accountability in the United States and the World Bank. Zoe Young explains how the GEF was formed by Western governments to deflect protest against the environmental impacts of the World Bank and the IMF in the 1980s, while retaining control of the scope of the new treaties. She examines the central paradox of the GEF: although intended to promote reform and co-operation for 'global' conservation, the GEF cannot challenge damaging economic policies or powerful interest groups. Instead it has helped to put prices on nature and open up Southern resources and markets to 'global' experts and investors. As our landscapes, fertility, cultures and ecosystems are being destroyed every day, Zoe Young gives a disturbing account of the complex issues that must be addressed before the world's environment can be managed more democratically -- and effectively.