World Bank Quotes

• The world is governed by institutions that are not democratic - the World Bank, the IMF, the WTO.

  Jose Saramago

  Imf, World, Institutions

  "Still a street-fighting man". Interview with Stephanie Merritt, www.theguardian.com. April 30, 2006.

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• The IMF and the World Bank, the most opaque and secretive entities, put millions into NGOs who fight against "corruption" and for "transparency." They want the Rule of Law - as long as they make the laws. They want transparency in order to standardise a situation, so that global capital can flow without any impediment.

  Arundhati Roy

  Fighting, Order, Law

  Source: www.truth-out.org

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• The World Bank is now the biggest culprit in the debt crisis.

  Susan George

  Debt, World, Culprit

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• The Muslim leaders swallow the advice of the Western powers and bodies like the IMF and World Bank, even when it is bad for their countries and they know this.

  Abu Bakar Bashir

  Country, Leader, Advice

  "'We Should Not Fear Being Called Radical'". Interview with Farish A. Noor, theseoultimes.com.

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• I don't think anybody really thinks that one should get rid of the World Bank. Reform is one thing, but getting rid of it I think would be wrong.

  Joseph Stiglitz

  Thinking, World, Reform

  Source: www.progressive.org

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• We have, in this country, one of the most corrupt institutions the world has ever known. I refer to the Federal Reserve Board. This evil institution has impoverished the people of the United States and has practically bankrupted our government. It has done this through the corrupt practices of the moneyed vultures who control it.

  Louis Thomas McFadden

  Country, Government, Practice

  "100 Years Is Enough: Time to Make the Fed a Public Utility" by Ellen Brown, www.huffingtonpost.com. December 23, 2013.

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• We now know that climate action does not require economic sacrifice. This is fully in line with the World Bank Group's findings. It is up to all of us to make smart policy choices that will help combat climate change. For example, putting a price on carbon is a necessary step and could drive resources and investments to a cleaner economy.

  Sri Mulyani Indrawati

  Smart, Sacrifice, Climate Action

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• I want to eradicate poverty. I think that theres a tremendous passion for that inside the World Bank.

  Jim Yong Kim

  Passion, Thinking, World

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• I think that the movement against the World Bank, against the globalization process that is happening, is very positive. We need a globalization, a globalization of people who are committed to social justice, to economic justice. We need a globalization of people who are committed to saving this earth, to making sure that the water is drinkable, that the air is breathable.

  Assata Shakur

  Thinking, Air, People

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• The World Trade Organization, The World Bank, The International Monetary Fund and other financial institutions virtually write economic policy and parliamentary legislation. With a deadly combination of arrogance and ruthlessness, they take their sledgehammers to fragile, interdependent, historically complex societies and devastate them, all under the fluttering banner of 'reform'.

  Arundhati Roy

  Writing, Organization, Arrogance

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• I do wish that the IMF and the World Bank would disappear soon.

  Hugo Chavez

  Wish, Imf, World

  Source: www.progressive.org

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• It’s not that Monsanto is making money out of the blue. It’s making money by coercing and literally forcing people to pay for what was free. Take water, for instance. Water has always been free. We’ve never paid for drinking water. The World Bank says the reason water has been misused is because it was never commercially priced. But the reason it’s been misused is because it was wasted by the big users—industry, which polluted it.

  Vandana Shiva

  Drinking, Blue, People

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• I'd worked on leprosy and malaria in India [at the World Bank] and asked myself the question: Why do we let 2 million children die every year around the world for not having clean water? Because they're faceless and nameless. So, for me, Facebook looked like it was going to solve the problem of the invisible victim.

  Sheryl Sandberg

  Children, Work, Women

  "Facebook's Sheryl Sandberg: who are you calling bossy?" by Emma Brockes, www.theguardian.com. April 5, 2014.

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• In 88 poor countries for which we have data, in each and every one of the 88, the PPP for food shows that poor people can buy less food than you would expect from the PPP that the World Bank is using. The reason for this is obvious on reflection. It has to do with the fact that most foodstuffs are tradable commodities: basic foodstuffs, such as rice, flour and beans, can easily be conveyed across national borders and their prices will therefore roughly mirror the exchange rates among currencies.

  Thomas Pogge

  Country, Reflection, Mirrors

  Source: www.truth-out.org

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• Ya know, Hitler was this evil, evil man. But with the World Bank and Israel manipulating America, he might have been on to something.

  Zach Braff

  Men, Israel, America

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• The UK is the number one destination in European Union for inward investment, the World Bank has ranked the UK as the sixth easiest place in he world to do business, so any organisation that makes promises about investment in the UK should live up to those promises.

  James Brokenshire

  Numbers, Promise, Inward

  Source: www.telegraph.co.uk

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• Well the specific role of the World Bank is to be ready with financial assistance immediately after this emergency takes place because you need to reconnect water, you need to reconnect power, you need roads, you need bridges, and that has to be done urgently.

  James Wolfensohn

  Power, Bridges, Water

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• The United States has given frequent and enthusiastic support to the overthrow of democracy in favor of "investor friendly" regimes. The World Bank, IMF, and private banks have consistently lavished huge sums on terror regimes, following their displacement of democratic governments, and a number of quantitative studies have shown a systematic positive relationship between U.S. and IMF / World Bank aid to countries and their violations of human rights.

  Edward S. Herman

  Country, Government, Violation Of Human Rights

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• In the real world, banks hang onto their money for fear of making bad loans, no matter how many bailouts or stimulus packages Washington passes.

  Dick Morris

  Real, World, Matter

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• My dad's main client was the World Bank, and he spent most of his time traveling to Third World countries. His particular interest lay in the eradication of poverty through development and business.

  Hugh Jackman

  Country, Dad, Poverty

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• The culture of death is imposed by economic and political interests, the arrogance of power, corruption. I blame the first world for having taken our riches for so many years. I am speaking of the superpowers that dominate the life of the world. More concretely, the World Bank, the IMF. Those that have caused and tolerated the death of our people, those responsible for the plundering of the third world. Silence is also part of repression.

  Rigoberta Menchu

  Taken, Years, People

  Source: www.indians.org

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• Too many politicians seem to reach for 'infrastructure' as the default answer to investment, as if roads and bridges were the answer to everything. Even the IMF and the World Bank seem to mainly offer infrastructure spending as an alternative to austerity, although they are right to focus on the need for investment.

  Mariana Mazzucato

  Bridges, Focus, Needs

  Source: www.salon.com

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• The director of the institute where I was working apologized about these young, enthusiastic researchers when the World Bank visited because he was afraid the institute would lose the World Bank consultancies.I went back home and started the Research Foundation for Science, Technology, and Ecology—an extremely elaborate name for the tiny institute that I started in my mother’s cow shed. My parents handed over family resources and said, “Put them to public purpose.” That’s how I survived.

  Vandana Shiva

  Mother, Home, Technology

  Interview with David Barsamian, www.sharedhost.progressive.org. September 29, 2011.

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• One particular spark was when I went back to my favorite spot in the mountains where my father always used to take us before my graduate studies in Canada and finding that the stream I had gone swimming in wasn’t there. The forest had been converted into an apple orchard with World Bank financing. The entire place, literally, had changed.

  Vandana Shiva

  Father, Swimming, Apples

  Interview with David Barsamian, www.sharedhost.progressive.org. September 29, 2011.

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• Today there are a lot places where people say they're just hopeless. If I can come from a hopeless country, get an education, become a hyphenated American and become president of the World Bank, it's my moral duty to make sure that every single person on the planet has that opportunity.

  Jim Yong Kim

  Country, Opportunity, People

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