The International Money Fund is the center of a global financial system that encourages budgetary discipline and full integration into world trade to facilitate development and alleviate poverty. Yet this policy "conditionality" of the IMF is highly controversial. Critics state that the fifty years of IMF existence has been "fifty years too long," and that its doctrinaire policy must change or Fund programs will have only limited ability t achieve their objectives.

IMF Programmes in Developing Countries examines these claims and counter-claims, discussing the extent to which IMF policies have adapted to global demands and the subsequent effects of Fund programs.