Nearly 1 in 5 staffers at the International Monetary Fund told an internal survey that their work had been “unduly” influenced by higher-ups, with concerns that this could result in self-censoring behaviors while “undermining analytical integrity.”
The review of institutional safeguards, released Thursday, was launched by IMF’s board following last year’s bombshell allegation that the current managing director, Kristalina Georgieva, engaged in data manipulation to favor China in her previous role as chief executive of the World Bank.
The IMF board decided to keep Georgieva in her job, though the event cast a cloud of doubt over her leadership. The institution touted this week’s report as a sign of transparency and accountability.
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The review also showed that staffers sometimes feel their country reports come under pressure to shoehorn in certain ideas because they’re important to IMF’s overall agenda — even if those ideas are less important for those specific countries.
The document provided the emerging hot topics of climate and digitalization as two examples, but there was also a worry that staffers were selecting issues for the annual country reviews — a key mechanism for tracking macroeconomics around the world — that would not offend national authorities.
Ceyla Pazarbasioglu, a senior IMF director and the chair of the staff working group on data integrity, which was key to the latest review, said the institution would need to remain “humble” as it learns going ahead, but she insisted that any cases of untoward behavior were uncommon.
“There are instances of undue influence. They are rare, but they do happen. And we have to guard against it,” she said on a call with reporters Thursday. She also said that sometimes what a staff member might see as undue influence is more of a back-and-forth between the various wings of the institution, noting that IMF “is not a purely technical institution.”
The review largely found that IMF has “robust” safeguards in place to protect against pressure campaigns, even if it could do more going forward. It also must find ways to address staff concerns more rapidly, the report said.
The “overall assessment is that strong frameworks and processes are in place to support the integrity of data and analysis at the Fund,” according to the report.
The IMF executive board and management both signed off on a statement pledging to come up with a “comprehensive set of measures and policy changes” by the end of the calendar year, while more immediate steps will include measures to increase transparency and internal awareness of accountability mechanisms for issues pertaining to undue pressure.
About the author
Shabtai Gold
Shabtai Gold is a Senior Reporter based in Washington. He covers multilateral development banks, with a focus on the World Bank, along with trends in development finance. Prior to Devex, he worked for the German Press Agency, dpa, for more than a decade, with stints in Africa, Europe, and the Middle East, before relocating to Washington to cover politics and business.