Fragile States & Financial Stability * – Aldic

By: Karim Daher[2]

As acknowledged and highlighted in the latest IEO’s evaluation report[3], to date there is no universal common definition of “fragile state” or a fixed list of the latter[4]. Indeed, the factors creating fragile states are diverse and the fragility is manifested in a variety of forms. For instance, states at war or post-conflict states[5] are generally labelled as fragile and attract a great deal of attention because they continue to export disorder that the international community strives to prevent and combat since state failure presents a genuine threat to the international system. This being highlighted, it remains understood that the most common definition or criterion of fragile states relies on the definition that fragile states are those states that lack the capacity and/or will (governance and politics) to perform a set of functions that are necessary to the security and wellbeing of their citizens (among which poverty reduction, social inclusion, employment, public health, environment, education, etc.). In other words: “State failure is an inability to make collective decisions and to enforce them, if necessary”[6]. In such a case the word “fragile” may be substituted by “failed”.

From a financial perspective those countries may be identified as countries with economies less diversified and more susceptible to shocks, characterized by macroeconomic weakness and imbalances in addition to lower economic growth rates, higher inflation and huge government debt. Taking into consideration in this regard that financial health is the first requirement of political stability.

Nonetheless and despite the foregoing, some countries not on the official list (such as Lebanon for instance) may share elements of fragility, whereas countries on the list may exit out of fragility while others not on the list may slip into fragility.

With this in view, several studies and surveys assumed that the capacity building and good governance, especially democracy, are unlikely to be met until a certain stage of economic stabilization and development as well as financial stability has been achieved.

Thus and in order to meet the objective of making progress towards a stable and sustainable macroeconomic environment that is consistent with strong and sustainable growth and development that will entitle in turn a fragile state to exit out of the list, stakeholders (donors, international organizations and authorities in concerned countries) should focus on policies and actions and provide guidance and suggestions that promote financial stability.

Focusing on the issues and themes that are relevant for stability implies addressing and covering priority areas and key issues among which: (i) strengthen resilience to shocks; (ii) growth and job creation; (iii) strengthen financial sector and monitory policy; and (iv) adopt appropriate policies to promote fiscal reforms and sustainability.

However and since it is indisputable that threats to stability result mainly and directly from fiscal policy missteps, we will focus hereafter on the fiscal policy as a major key issue owing to the fact that state capacity, and thus strength, depends on taxable capacity. Besides, fiscal policy is often part of the policy mix to address macro-critical challenges that are not necessarily directly related to public finances (growth, unemployment and inequality). Indeed, “Adopting an appropriate fiscal policy is vital to maintain a country domestic and balance of payment stability, and often global stability”[7].

On another and complementary note, we will stress on the role and essential contribution of the IMF[8] to restore macroeconomic and fiscal stability.

Fiscal Policy and Guidance as a key issue for stabilization.

Since the 70^thof the last century, rich states donors have assisted a particular class of states at risk of instability or with low income revenue or identified as least developed countries with financial resources, aid modalities and adapted programs to foster economic development, provide emergency assistance, and promote peace and security. Various international organizations were established to assist the aforesaid states in performing theses sovereign tasks, in coordination with donors.

During the cold war, donors were not particularly worried about whether their money was used well, so long as it maintained a friendly government in power. However, after the cold war, the things substantially changed and official development assistance provided to many states dropped off. Donors increasingly targeted their aid at states that had the capacity (governance and institutions) to use it well. They began to design development policies that were meant to address insecurity and poverty at the same time. Security was being redefined to include economic, social and environmental factors[9]. From 2008 onwards, after the financial crisis, the international context has undergone additional significant changes materialized by a reduction in aid flows accompanied by a call from the international community for developing countries, especially those with the weakest revenue performance, to strengthen their revenue raising capacity based on better designed tax systems and stronger revenue institutions. “Aid for trade” has become “aid for taxes paid,” as reflected by the commitment of the signatories to the 2015 Addis Tax Initiative (ATI)[10].

On the expenditure side, developing countries, notably the Fragile States, that receive significant grant aid, were requested as well to demonstrate transparency and accountability in their use of public funds.

The IMF policy paper released on May 2017 in order to explore options for reform highlighted the importance of targeting fiscal and expenditures reforms to achieve stability and secure revenues to help countries exit fragility. The mandate of IMF to assist in building fiscal capacity was intended to complement its lending mission and surveillance operations.

However the approach to building fiscal capacity in Fragile States is supposed to take into consideration the stage of fragility and country-specific circumstances and conditions including absorptive capacity. Moreover, a differentiation should be made between revenue and expenditures policies and reforms. Sustainable macro-fiscal framework and expenditures strategy are practically inseparables.

Revenue Policies and Reforms.

As highlighted here before, it is indisputable that the choice of either the policy or steps that should be adopted taxation wise should be guided by country (FS) specific circumstances as well as by operational and practical constraints; taking into account the significant analytic challenges involved in the choice of priorities and urgent needs. Hence, the overall approach to building fiscal capacity in FS differs depending on the stage of fragility.

The first stage following the immediate post-conflict/post-disaster stage, includes a focus on tax revenue collection as an urgent need to cover the several operating costs and aggregate expenditures. The targeting is on easy-to-collect taxes as customs duties at the border and selective high-yielding excise taxes along with the introducing or rebuilding or modernizing of organizational structures and basic processes of the administration.

The second stage prevails once countries become more stable (but still vulnerable), where the objective should stress on the modernization of fiscal institutions through medium-term revenue and expenditures strategies; taking into consideration certainly the country-specific circumstances and conditions.

The overall plan and connected objectives on the medium-term consist in building fiscal capacity by securing stable, well accepted and elastic revenues to achieve fiscal and financial stability and help countries exit fragility. Effective reform can help combatting corruption and improve public perceptions of fiscal institutions. Several measures may be adopted in this regard accompanied with practical actions and procedures based on each country’s particularities and absorptive capacity as well as the relationship between taxpayers and governments; insofar each of such measures has implications and may lead to opposite results and harmful conflicts and setbacks.

Mobilizing revenues more efficiently implies a broad consensus on several measures or steps that should first and foremost be adopted; and among which for elucidation the following basic reforms:

Improving revenue collection by broadening the tax base:

This measure aims to broaden the tax base by increasing the number of registered taxpayers and improving compliance with tax obligations, while minimizing the cost of complying with these obligations. Through broader taxation the governments could raise additional revenues in an equitable manner to fund inclusive growth and social and infrastructure programs. The success of such initiative is nonetheless dependent on:

Securing political support and commitment; and
implementing simple procedures and automated systems; and
ensuring necessary financial resources;
strengthening the cooperation and exchange of information between the Ministry of finance on the one hand and local authorities and/or municipalities on the other hand in order to obtain accurate information and to improve and heighten identification of prospective taxpayers; and
waiving bank secrecy; and
seeing that the economic activity generating the tax base should be within the reach of the authority of the state.

Simplify tax collection and make it more efficient:

Tax administration should be able to rely on simple regulations or application rules, short tax forms, fair and well-balanced procedures and efficient and fast organs for conflicts resolution since simple tax legislation also reduces the likelihood of tax disputes. Steps to strengthen tax administration and improve taxpayers compliance can help broaden tax collections in an equitable manner. Besides, the tendency of resorting permanently to tax rebates and amnesty should be abandoned inasmuch it affects equity and fairness and makes it necessary for legislative bodies to raise future tax rates or borrow additional funds or reduce costs in order to compensate tax gaps benefits resulting therefrom. Hence, taxpayer compliance should improve with a perception that most are complying and those who do not comply experience adverse consequences.

Reviewing the fundamentals of the tax system and adopting more efficient taxation:

It should consist first in the rethinking and in the change of the whole regime of tax exemptions that hampers fiscal revenue mobilization and causes serious distortion and imbalance between taxpayers. Indeed, in several countries like Lebanon for instance, corporate and personal income taxes suffer from widespread exemptions, often provided non-transparently and with discretion or that became obsolete with time, creating uneven playing field for businesses.

Besides, and since scheduled taxes still adopted in some of those fragile states generally exclude important revenues and assets from the tax base, the adoption of the general personal income tax on the whole revenues becomes a high priority. Indeed, this general tax laying on progressive rates is less prone to evasion through base erosion schemes.

Other noteworthy tax reforms may include as well, the introduction or strengthening of broad-base consumption taxes like the VAT which are easy to collect and hard to escape or avoid (tax evasion) due to its strict procedures of compliance and control.

To give due consideration to equity and fairness in both the making and administration of tax laws:

Building trust and cooperation with taxpayers becomes nowadays a priority of the new compliance improvement approach. Creating a sense of ‘fairness” will undoubtedly encourage all citizens to contribute willingly in the financing of state expenditures and activities. Hence, if citizens perceive that the system is reasonably fair, then they will comply and the collection of taxes will increase substantially.

Denmark can serve as a model in this regard. Although the said country has one of the highest taxation levels in the world, Danish people do not seem to complain about it. The welfare system subsidized by the State makes up for the tax pressure. It gives citizens equal access to a number of services free of charge: health care, education, child care, etc. The developed welfare state gives credibility to public officials. It is evidence that public funds are handled properly and used correctly. As a matter of fact, Denmark is the least corrupt country in the world in 2015

There are several dimensions that should be considered in determining tax equity and fairness among which[11]: (i) Horizontal Equity and Fairness (i.e. similarly situated taxpayers are taxed similarly); and (ii) Vertical Equity and Fairness (i.e. Taxes are based on the ability to pay → progressive rates); and (iii) Exchange Equity and Fairness (i.e. Over the long run taxpayers receive appropriate value for the taxes they pay); and finally (iv) Inter-Group Equity and Fairness (i.e. no group of taxpayers is favored to the detriment of another without good cause); and (v) Compliance Equity and Fairness (i.e. all taxpayers pay what they owe on a timely basis).

Nonetheless, equity should be evaluated within the contest of the entire tax system, not just the income tax and not on case-by-case basis.

In parallel, Tax revenues must be pooled to fund essential shared service (education, health care, public safety, retirement pensions, etc.) and/or invested in long-lived assets so to benefit to future taxpayers as well. Many survey and studies highlighted the unwillingness of the public to provide resources to a government that was not perceived to serve their needs. Parliaments and governments should therefore strive to use fiscal policy and derived revenues to better invest in people and infrastructures. Indeed, fiscal policy is a key lever for governments to ensure that the benefit of growth is shared more broadly.

A key priority is henceforth building a broader and more equitable tax base and reprioritizing government spending (more particularly devoting revenue windfalls) toward infrastructure and social priorities. The quality of public services should become a priority and be continuously improved and its access broadened to all citizens.

Those measures could help building public support and provide legitimacy to tax reforms; notably by avoiding reversal of unpopular policies mainly as regard to subsidy and benefit cuts or tax increases during downturns.

Finally, it has been observed that frequent changes to the tax law affect equity and fairness as well by disrupting taxpayer expectations and making tax-planning more difficult. In fact, it disrupts taxpayers’ ability to evaluate the long-term impact of the tax law, and therefore, its overall equity and fairness.

Expend the use of earmarked taxes:

In certain countries, the use of earmarked taxes such as in the case of education increases the tax payers’ knowledge of how taxes are channeled, which in-turn could increase taxpayers’ vigilance over the efficiency of the service provided and influence for its improvement.

Revenues generated by the development of international cooperation and exchange of information in tax matters:

Upon application of the CRS[12] with its broaden mechanism of exchange of information as well as with the entering into force in the near future of several other instruments needed to tackle loopholes and connected tax evasion – such as on the one hand the MDR[13] and, on the other hand, the BEPS[14] package which provides fifteen (15) actions that equip governments with the domestic and international instruments needed to tackle aggressive tax planning and optimizations that exploit gaps and mismatches in tax rules to artificially shift profits to low or no-tax locations where there is little or no economic activity – some fragile states or alike will have the necessary tools to ensure that profits are taxed where economic activities generating the profits are performed and where value is created. This can provide a strong handle to address evasion by the wealthiest. These tools may also give businesses greater certainty by reducing disputes over the application of international tax rules and standardizing compliance requirements.

Expenditures policies and reforms.

It has been proven that well-designed fiscal institutions can promote credibility and sustainability, enhance transparency and controls, help assess risks, and ensure appropriate use of public resources. However they could also impede effectiveness if not properly designated.

Therefore sovereign countries should strive to set in their public financial management (PFM) rules and measures and include structural reforms enhancing accountability and transparency in both the national budget and the expenditures. Besides, expenditure control should be strengthened and modernized insofar it is a key element of budgetary process and accountability. Thus, when budgets exclude major expenditures items, then it’s doubtful that resources are being allocated to priority programs and that legal control and public accountability are both enforced.

With this end in view, several measures should be considered and assessed in order to serve as effective tools and structural reforms to help reinforce countries’ dilapidated public finance and infrastructures, abetting a boost in economic growth. Hereafter set out, a glimpse of some of those structural reforms.

Change in the composition of public expenditures:

A substantial change should occur in the composition of public expenditures with less spending on wages, indemnities and subsidies and more on capital expenditure and public services notably on social and infrastructures priorities owing to their ability to ensure greater inclusiveness and higher growth. Thus, better quality and higher levels of health and education services as well convenient jobs can reduce inequality and spur long-term growth by raising human capital of all citizens[15]. It will build moreover a more vibrant private sector that promotes higher growth and job creation; which will entail moving away from a model where the state is the first employer. However, the desired public services should be delivered in a cost-effective and fiscally sustainable manner to make it sustainable and attractive to both investors and users.

Strengthen and improve the internal procedures of control:

A special attention should be provided to the improvement of internal controls through the creation or the strengthening (as the case may be) of an internal control framework (Audit Office notably) to manage the budget execution and reporting process as well as to reduce budget overruns and unauthorized expenditures. It includes inter alia the implementation or the restoring of basic fiscal controls of the accounting standards, annual financial statements, cash and debt management and the accounts of the state owned enterprises.

Improve the accountability for execution of the budget:

The concept of performance budgeting should be introduced whether through Organic Budget laws (LOLF in France[16], Tunisia and Morocco) or the top-down budgeting system, in order to take into account both the economic forecasts and the fiscal target and hold the government responsible of the outcomes. Those budgeting systems make it easier to have the budget aligned appropriately with policy priorities and emphasis on policy objectives pursued and results achieved. It generally embodies a brief policy statement spelling out the expected outcomes and performance as well as a brief of how the objectives will be achieved. It allows achievements to be measured in of each line ministry in a more transparent measure.

A segregated budget on its side, is unlikely on the one hand, to permit the government to develop a cohesive strategy that can lead to sustainable and durable growth and, on the other hand, to make the said government politically liable of such strategy and Budget execution[17].

Abide with the principle of unity in the Budget preparation:

Budget has to be fully integrated. Consequently Budget coverage, a key area in preparation and execution, should adhere to good practices recommended by public finance guidelines. Otherwise improper coverage will weaken both financial management and the conduct of fiscal policy. However, if proper auditing is not enforced, the process of coverage may not be in its turn seriously addressed and enforced.

Moreover, a segregated budget is unlikely to permit any government to develop a cohesive strategy that can lead to sustainable and durable growth[18]. Thus, estimates of all revenues and expenditures should be included in the Budget in order to ensure the proper acknowledgement and authorization by the Parliament. This entails as a result the inclusion of Extra-Budgetary Funds (EBFs) in the budget since the said funds may become a channel for non-transparent expenditures; or may be channeled for other purposes than those they were intended for.

Needless to precise finally, that the preceding indicative proposals are without prejudice to several other important ancillary and complementary reforms that may be implemented concomitantly such as for instance the establishment of budget framework and the implementation of IT systems that take into account the impact of policies over the longer-term and adopt adequate planning.

IMF’s engagement and expectations.

As part of its primary mission, the International Monetary Fund (IMF) regularly produces and proposes new policies to fragile states or other states sharing same elements of fragility, exploring options for reform, or reviewing existing IMF policies and operations.

Hence, Article IV consultations[19] (Article IV surveillance process) focuses on the conduct of economic and financial policies pursued by members to promote economic and financial stability and more particularly present and prospective domestic and balance of payments stability. It addresses spillovers from members’ economic and financial policies that may significantly affect global stability, including alternative policy options that would minimize their adverse impact.

Recently, an evaluation report assessed the IMF’s engagement with countries in fragile and conflict affected situations (FCS)[20]. Notwithstanding the fact that the said evaluation report has straightforwardly recognized the important contribution that the IMF has made in fragile sates, including helping to restore macroeconomic stability, build core macroeconomic policy institutions, and catalyze donor support, it however brought to the fore the failures to meet the expected or targeted objectives.

IMF’s Contribution:

IMF has performed its various roles towards countries in post-conflict and other fragile situations quite effectively. Its engagement takes place through vehicles established for all member countries; namely: through (i) Article IV consultations and connected surveillance process; (ii) financing and other support arrangements and (iii) capacity building such as program design, policy support and guidelines in building resilience.

Of the three above mentioned vehicles, “surveillance is obligatory on the part of both the IMF and the member country concerned, while it is only at a member’s request that the IMF provides financial or capacity development support. Because in fragile states the policy advice role of surveillance is highly integrated with other activities, this evaluation primarily focuses on program lending and capacity development rather than on surveillance per se”[21].

In terms of the IMF’s financing role, the financing facilities granted by the IMF are mainly addressed to low-income countries in fragile situation. IMF’s role in fragile states has been particularly important in providing support in early stages of macroeconomic stabilization after a period of conflict or a natural disaster. Besides, the IMF has ramped up support to countries with financial arrangements to facilitate the implementation of crisis resolving measures. This was particularly true where borrowing needs were great, given the pressures to invest in health services, education, and infrastructure, as well as to meet pressing security and refugee needs. IMF also engaged with stakeholders to mobilize broad creditor support for fragile states with outstanding external arrears to official creditors.

In point of fact and although the financial activity does not fall within its main and key role, IMF’s financing role in fragile states has been catalytic. It was broadly admitted that the IMF “had played a critical signaling role, providing the donor community with a degree of assurance that a country’s public finances were benefitting from IMF guidance and monitoring and that donor financial assistance would be used in a transparent and sustainable macroeconomic framework. Development partners often considered IMF involvement in a country—especially in the context of a financing arrangement— as a de facto, if not de jure, precondition for their own financial engagement. Given this special role among a country’s development partners, the IMF has typically exercised considerable influence with the authorities well beyond the amount of financing it provides, including in situations where countries have preferred not to access IMF financing.”[22]

As for the area of capacity building, it is actually the area where the IMF makes its greatest contribution because weak institutions are at the root of fragility. Indeed, IMF has helped countries to build basic policy-making and institutional capacity in the core areas of IMF expertise through on-the-ground follow-up and steps towards integration with surveillance and program work. The focus of the IMF’s capacity building efforts appeared to be stressing toward enhancing institutional and policymaking capacity in member countries to boost resilience to shocks, especially in low-income fragile or small states. It has targeted essentially areas such as revenue collection, public expenditure control, central banking, currency reform, and statistics. In this critical role, the IMF is broadly acknowledged to have had a high impact.

Proposals as regard to IMF’s policies and operational work:

One should admit that despite the overall positive role, the IMF’s engagement with fragile states seems conflicted and its impact falls short of what could be achieved.

Among the several pitfalls that have risen up as regard to the IMF’s operational work, we notice that the IMF’s staff was most often not adequately trained and/or qualified to deal with the broader political and noneconomic features that often affect significantly outcomes. This was mainly imputable to the low incentives (career-related and otherwise) allocated to encourage IMF staff to work on fragile sates. Moreover, it is also acknowledged that security concerns affected the turnover of staff assigned to fragile states and entailed a serious ignorance of field’s reality and actual problems since dedicated staff was not assigned to a particular fragile state for a sufficiently long period of time in order to acquire a minimum level of country-specific expertise. From a financial perspective, IMF’s financial toolkit, with its relatively short-term focus, was not inherently well suited to the circumstances of fragile states and even interest-free concessional IMF resources had to be repaid within ten years. No specific facility is dedicated to fragile states and several states gain access to Fund resources only after complicated arrears-clearance operations. Besides, the IMF has been nimble in meeting some particular immediate financial needs. This in part reflects the fact that the IMF is not the cheapest source of concessional financing. This is why many fragile states have recourse to more concessional sources of donor money, including much longer-term loans and grants.

Finally, it resulted from some of the assessed situations, that program design—and associated conditionality in the case of a financing arrangement—was not sufficiently flexible and did not reflect a sufficient appreciation of the institutional and other noneconomic aspects, including the political context, faced by assisted fragile states. The IMF did not sufficiently appreciate the deep-rooted nature of the encountered difficulties.

Thus, although the work with fragile states remains highly challenging, it typically requires long-term, patient modes of engagement that do not fit well with the IMF’s current standard business model. Efforts should be made therefore to adapt, in the light of the foregoing, IMF policies and practices to the fragile state’s needs, in particular concerning the following:

IMF should strive to provide training to a wider range of stakeholders such as officials (members of Parliament and local councilors) or civil society, through workshop and seminars, to ensure the effectiveness of the intended policies and programs.
IMF should increase on the ground visits by experienced staff to gain in-depth knowledge and provide appropriate, tailor-made support.
IMF should help in establishing (and/or financing) a program of on-line learning and to diffuse it widely as part of the financial literacy; notably through simplified tools and explanations (adapted educational and public approach).
IMF should attach the greatest importance to the fact that sometimes for specific fragile states, external efforts to strengthen states with institutional reform are often destabilizing, not improving, because of the political implications of those reforms for local actors. The plurality of actors involved in external assistance also tends to impose a huge, unmanageable list of demands on weak governments and to treat outcomes considered unsuccessful as a matter of “political will” rather than local capacity and resources to implement these demands or the genuine political conflicts they provoke.
Moreover, it has been ascertained that many submitted policies are in conflict with each other and in some cases with their stated goals (ex: deadlock on decision-making policies owing to ethnic or religious conflicts and minority rights protections) and should be harmonized and pragmatically adjusted. Thus and as rightly highlighted by Susan L. Woodward[23], “many current policies aimed at preventing or reversing state failure are actually in conflict with each other and in some cases with their stated goals. For example, policies for reconciliation after civil war or for preventing what is currently labelled ethnic conflict, such as minority rights protections, power-sharing, and multi-ethnic rules and institutions, tend to create such fragmented political systems that no decisions can be taken. That is, the deadlock on decision-making characteristic of failing or failed states can be a result of external templates and demands. Equally, the effect of IMF and World Bank good governance programs is not only to cut public expenditures on critical social and economic programs such as elementary schools, public transport, and basic health services, but also institutional, strengthening the executive branch against representative assemblies and the finance ministry against the development and social ministries.” It goes without saying that this discrepancy between policies and action has undermined the credibility of the IMF’s commitments in this area. Therefore and in order to restore such credibility, the IMF needs to send a clear signal of its commitment to adopt consistent sustained action that will come up to public’s and donor’s expectations.

[1] Conference held at the American University of Beirut on Tuesday July 31, 2018 during the workshop “The IMF and Fragile States-Evaluation Report 2018” co-organized by Le Cercle des Economistes Arabes and the Independent Evaluation Office (IEO) of the International Monetary Fund. Published in Adel legal gazette on January 2019.

[2] Lawyer and Tax expert- Lecturer in tax law and public finance at the University Saint Joseph (USJ); President of the Lebanese Association for Taxpayers’ Rights (ALDIC).

[3] The evaluation report on the ‘IMF and Fragile States” issued by the Independent Evaluation Office (IEO) of the IMF on March 6, 2018.

[4] Updated once a year by the IMF.

[5] i.e. for the IMF with a peacekeeping operation there during the previous three years.

[6] Susan L. Woodward – “Fragile States: Exploring the Concept”- Paper presented to the “States and Security” Learning Group at the Peace and Social Justice meeting of the Ford Foundation, Rio de Janeiro, Brazil, November 29, 2004.

[7] IMF- Guidance Note for Surveillance under Article IV Consultation- May 2015.

[8] The International Monetary Fund

[9] “Donors and the ‘Fragile States’ Agenda”: A Survey of Current Thinking and Practice Report submitted to the Japan International Cooperation Agency on March 2006- Overseas Development Institute (Odi).

[10] Policy paper titled “Building Fiscal Capacity in Fragile States (FS)” submitted on May 12, 2017, to the Executive Board of the International Monetary Fund (IMF) for discussion.

[11] AICPA (2007-2008). Guiding Principles for Tax Equity and Fairness – P.3. & AICPA (2005). Understanding Tax Reform: A Guide to 21st Century Alternative, p. 11.

[12] By virtue of both (i) the Multilateral Convention on Mutual Administrative Assistance in Tax Matters (MAC); and (ii) the Multilateral Competent Authority Agreements (MCAA)

[13] Model Mandatory Disclosure Rules for Addressing CRS Avoidance Arrangements and Opaque Offshore Structures

[14] Base Erosion and Profit Shifting

[15] IMF “Opportunity for All- Promoting Growth and Inclusiveness in the Middle East and North Africa- No 18/11-2018

[16] Loi organique relative aux lois de finances No 692-2001 dated August 1, 2001.

[17] Karim Daher & Krystel El Hajj: “Budget Must be Specialized to Maintain Credibility and Transparency”- LCPS Policy Briefs December 31, 2013.

[18] Dr. Mounir Rached- “Budget Coverage in Lebanon: Consequences and Recommendations”- LCPS workshop 2012.

[19] Article IV of the Articles of Agreements requires the IMF to assess members’ compliance with their obligations under Article IV, Section 1 and, in particular, to exercise firm surveillance over the conduct of their exchange rate policies (bilateral surveillance), and to oversee the operation of the international monetary system to ensure its effective operation (multilateral surveillance). As a means of enabling the Fund to discharge its surveillance responsibilities, Article IV imposes on members procedural obligations to consult when requested by the Fund.

[20] Evaluation report on the ‘IMF and Fragile States” issued by the Independent Evaluation Office (IEO) of the IMF on March 6, 2018.

[21] The evaluation report on the ‘IMF and Fragile States” issued by the Independent Evaluation Office (IEO) of the IMF on March 6, 2018; p.9.

[22] Same source and reference; p.15.

[23] “Fragile States: Exploring the Concept”- Paper presented to the “States and Security” Learning Group at the Peace and Social Justice meeting of the Ford Foundation, Rio de Janeiro, Brazil, November 29, 2004.