Compliance with International Monetary Fund concessional lending policies and economic and social rights fulfillment

Does compliance with International Monetary Fund (IMF) concessional lending conditions improve or harm the fulfillment of economic and social rights? While existing scholarship examines IMF program participation, the duration of programs, and the number of conditions imposed, compliance remains an underexplored dimension of this literature. We argue that compliance with IMF conditionality will have an overall negative effect on economic and social rights. Additionally, increased levels of compliance reduces the potential policy space governments are able to choose, meaning that compliance will also decrease the heterogeneity of outcomes. Drawing on data from the IMF’s Monitoring of Fund Arrangements dataset and the Human Rights Measurement Initiative’s (HRMI) Economic and Social Rights scores, we analyze 63 countries between the years 2003 and 2021 to evaluate whether compliance with IMF conditionality affects government fulfillment of economic and social rights. We find, using a variety of quantitative methodologies, robust support for our arguments. We also disaggregate policy conditionality by category and find that compliance with both political conditions and revenue conditions independently produce negative ESR outcomes. Further, increased compliance does, on average, reduce heterogeneity. These findings provide important evidence that the Fund has not adequately addressed the human rights consequences of its programs.