(ECONOMICS) international bank created after World War 2 to coordinate currency stabilization. Main policy
tool consists of lending
money to central bank of countries facing a liquidity crisis.
In some cases, as when a member
government is insolvent, the IMF will impose a structural adjustment program (SAP) requiring the government to jettison programs it has to serve the poor. For this reason, the IMF is often harshly criticized.
It is often
said that the International Monetary Fund makes economic crises worse by imposing the same austerity program everywhere, thereby further reducing a member
state's ability to pay its sovereign
debt.
(Another way of putting this is that the IMF's policies are pro-cyclical]