And the Alternative Would Be?

Hundreds protest global lending:

Hundreds of activists peacefully demonstrated yesterday against alleged abuses by large American corporations and international lending agencies, saying their policies are harmful to poor people in Latin America and elsewhere.

[...]

''For the last 50 years we've been attacked by the International Monetary Fund'' because its lending policies funnel money away from social programs in Argentina, said Graciela Monteagudo, a member of the Argentina Autonomist Project.

While I am no giant booster of everything that the IMF and World Bank have done policy-wise during their existence, these kinds of protests beg some key questions, amongst them: if the WB and IMF didn't lend the monies in question, where would these economies be at this point in time? The protestors seems to think that the money would be there no matter what, which is hardly an accurate assessment.