Debt campaign
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Democracy & Debt: Reimagining Sovereignty in the Era of Global Financial Institutions
11 November 2025 - by Eric Toussaint, Ikram Ben Said, Rob Davies, Shereen Talat, Jerome Phelps
When debt dictates policy, what’s left of democracy? In many countries, elected governments are finding themselves boxed in, not by voters, but by creditors. From IMF reform packages to development bank loans, policy decisions are being shaped (…) -
COP30 and the Brazilian dilemma
6 November 2025 - by Gabriella Lima
A few days before the start of COP 30 in Brazil, we are publishing an article written by Gabriella Lima of CADTM Switzerland and published on 12 October 2025 by the Geneva daily Le Courrier. Gabriella Lima is a doctoral student in contemporary (…) -
Philippines: Successful symposium on ‘Debt Chains and Displaced Lives: Confronting IMF-World Bank Legacies in the Global South’ on 10 June 2025 in Iligan
18 June 2025 - by CADTM International
The symposium was held at St Peter’s College in Iligan City, in the north of Mindanao Island in the Philippines. Around 100 people attended. The symposium addressed the historical role of the World Bank and the International Monetary Fund in (…) -
Debt-dependency: What price are we paying?
11 June 2025 - by Rovik Obanil
Rovik Obanil, Secretary General of the Freedom from Debt Coalition (FDC) in the Philippines, presented an overview of the historical evolution of debt in the country, highlighting how debt-driven development policies have caused significant (…) -
Debt and Immigration : 13 th Asian Regional School, Quezon City, Philippines
3 June 2025 - by Fernanda Gadea
The session on debt and immigration at the 13th Asian Regional School, held in Quezon City, Philippines, was organised by the International Institute for Research and Education (IIRE), Manila on June 1, 2025. The lecturers for this session (…) -
Growing State Debt & Attack on Federalism in India
24 February 2025 - by Sankha Subhra Biswas
At the CADTM South Asia meeting in Colombo, held from Thursday, 30 January to Saturday, 1 February, 2025, Sankha Subhra Biswas spoke about the growing debt crisis of the governments across various states in India and its impact on the federal (…) -
The Long Tradition of Debt Cancellation in Mesopotamia and Egypt from 3000 to 1000 BC
24 December 2024 - by Eric Toussaint
The year 2025 is considered by Christians to be a jubilee year under the banner of debt cancellation. To mark the occasion, the CADTM is republishing a series of articles on debt cancellation, the struggles for debt cancellation and the role of (…) -
Demanding Debt, Economic and Climate Justice!
23 October 2024 - by CADTM International, Collective
This year marks eighty years of the International Monetary Fund and the World Bank (IMF-WB) jointly designing and maintaining a global financial system that thrives on debt domination by rich countries, led by the G7, and the systemic (…) -
South Asia in the New Global Debt Crisis – A Call for Collective Solutions
22 September 2024 - by Amali Wedagedara
Debt payments of developing countries exceed their national revenue. According to a new report, Resolving The Worst Ever Global Debt Crisis, 118 developing countries are experiencing debt distress, with a disproportionate share of their national (…) -
Series : Social Movements and the Politics of Debt
The Debt System: The CADTM’s analyses and theoretical foundations
21 August 2024 - by CADTM, Christoph Sorg
Extract from “Social Movements and the Politics of Debt: Transnational Resistance against Debt on Three Continents” |Social Movements and the Politics of Debt From the “Committee for the Cancellation of Third World Debt” to the “Committee for (…) -
Series : Social Movements and the Politics of Debt
From the “Committee for the Cancellation of Third World Debt” to the “Committee for the Abolition of Illegitimate Debt”
16 August 2024 - by CADTM, Christoph Sorg
Excerpts from Social Movements and the Politics of Debt: Transnational Resistance against Debt on Three Continents. Having made Christoph Sorgh’s entire doctoral thesis [1] available to the public, the CADTM is glad to provide excerpts from it (…) -
Series : Social Movements and the Politics of Debt
Social Movements and the Politics of Debt
15 August 2024 - by CADTM, Christoph Sorg
Social Movements and the Politics of Debt, Transnational Resistance against Debt on Three Continents, Christoph Sorg, Amsterdam University Press, 2022 The CADTM is glad to publish Christoph Sorg’s full doctoral thesis entitled Social Movements (…) -
The Debt Trap and the interlinked Crises
12 November 2023 - by Eric Toussaint, Lidy B. Nacpil, Ahilan Kadirgamar, Kris Vanslambrouck, Anuradha Chenoy
We continue to witness country after country in the Global South falling victim to the ‘debt trap’ and inability to repay foreign loans. People in these countries bear the multiple burdens of indirect taxation as governments failing to repay (…) -
Debt Abolition Activists Gear Up for Countersummit as World Bank and IMF Meet
7 October 2023 - by Eric Toussaint, Ashley Smith
Activists in the global movement for debt abolition are gearing up to mobilize in Marrakesh, Morocco, where the World Bank and International Monetary Fund (IMF) are holding their annual meeting October 9-15, despite the devastating earthquake (…) -
We still need a debt jubilee: 25 years on from the Birmingham human chain
19 May 2023 - by Tim Jones
Twenty years ago today, as a wide-eyed 16 year old, I went on my first ever protest. Travelling to Birmingham with a group from my church, we joined 70,000 others to surround the G8 summit, demanding debt cancellation for 52 impoverished (…) -
Statement by academics on dealing with Sri Lankan debt
9 January 2023 - by Collective
Sri Lanka, along with many other low- and middle-income countries, has experienced a series of financial shocks due to both external and internal factors. Global forces have caused food and energy import costs to soar and interest rates to rise, (…) -
Declaration / Statement
Why the CADTM disputes the “Swapping public debt for climate action" proposal
14 December 2022 - by CADTM
It is essential to have a responsible debate and to demystify the “Swapping public debt for climate action” proposal, which is not new and was actually very popular in the 1990s, when members of the Paris Club used debt swaps to promote the (…) -
CADTM South Asia workshop
25 November 2022 - by CADTM
Committee for Abolition if Illegitimate Debt (CADTM) South Asia Law & Society Trust (LST, Sri Lanka) and the Movement for National Land and Agricultural Reform (MONLAR, Sri Lanka) COLOMBO, FRIDAY 02 – SATURDAY 03 DECEMBER 2022 The (…) -
Activists Disrupt Meeting to Demand ’Loan Sharks’ IMF and World Bank Cancel All Debt
13 October 2022 - by Brett Wilkins
“We need localization and ecological sustainability for the people, planet, and peace,” said CodePink’s Nancy Mancias. “We are calling on the IMF and World Bank to end its debt trap monetary practices which are causing countries to sink further (…) -
Global Week of Action for Justice and Debt Cancellation
10 October 2022 - by Collective
We stand in solidarity with the millions of people in countless countries who have taken to the streets over recent months to demand an end to debt domination and the destructive policies of the International Monetary Fund (IMF), the World Bank (…) -
Over 100 experts call on BlackRock to cancel Zambia’s debt
17 September 2022 - by Collective
Over 100 economists and development experts have called on BlackRock and other creditors to cancel a significant amount of Zambia’s debt. In an open letter released today, the signatories – including Jeffrey Sachs, Jayati Ghosh, Philip Alston, (…) -
After a decline in movements against illegitimate debt between 2016 and 2022, will there be a resurgence in 2023?
6 July 2022 - by Eric Toussaint
The decline in “debt” movements between 2016 and 2022 The period 2016-2022 has been marked by a retreat in anti-illegitimate debt movements on a global scale with a few important exceptions: Argentina since 2020, Puerto Rico in 2017-2019, Lebanon (…) -
No Climate Justice without Debt Justice
25 October 2021 - by Collective
The climate emergency is fuelling the accumulation of debt in countries in the global south. Countries suffering from the worst impacts of climate change have contributed very little to it, yet they are facing more expensive borrowing costs (…) -
Cancel the public debt held by the ECB and ’take back control’ of our destiny
10 February 2021 - by Collective
It is time for the European Central Bank to cancel a large of the public debt it holds, say more than a hundred economists from across Europe including Aurore Lalucq, Nicolas Dufrêne, Jézabel Couppey-Soubeyran, and Laurence Scialom. It is (…) -
Stand with Africans to Cancel the debt!
5 February 2021 - by CADTM Afrique, Womin
Debt cannot be repaid, first because if we don’t repay, lenders will not die. That is for sure. But if we repay, we are going to die. That is also for sure. Thomas Sankara, 1987 African movements unify to campaign for the cancellation of (…)
- Depression
- ICAN
- African Development Bank
- Agrarian Distress
- Agriculture and Food Sovereignty
- Antifascism
- Arbitration
- Audit
- Austerity/Structural Adjustment
- Bank of the South
- Banks
- Belt and Road
- Big Pharma
- BRICS
- Capitalism
- Colonial debt
- Colonialism
- Commercial agreements
- Commercialisation
- Corporate
- Corporate Debt
- Corruption / financial criminality
- Crisis
- De-dollarisation
- Debt crisis
- Debt in History
- Debt in Northern countries
- Development
- dollarisation
- ECB
- Ecology/Climate
- Energy
- External debt
- Extractivism
- Feminisms
- Films
- Financial crisis
- Free Trade/Trade Liberalisation
- G7 / G20
- Health
- Housing
- Human Rights
- Illegitimate debt
- ILO
- IMF
- Imperialism
- Inequality
- Inflation
- Initiative for the heavily indebted poor countries (HIPCs)
- Internal debt
CADTM
COMMITTEE FOR THE ABOLITION OF ILLEGITIMATE DEBT
8 rue Jonfosse
4000 - Liège- Belgique
+324 56 62 56 35
info@cadtm.org
