Two Summits in Bangkok: IMF/World Bank and Finance Ministers Inside, the People’s Assembly Outside

BANGKOK, Thailand, October 19 (IPS) – Bangkok hosted two summits last week. Inside the Queen Sirikit Convention Center, more than 15,000 finance ministers, central bank governors and CEOs of the world’s largest banks and corporations attended the Annual Meetings of the International Monetary Fund (IMF) and the World Bank. They flew in business class and slept in five-star hotels to talk about growth, inflation and public spending, and thus to decide the destiny of billions of people they will never meet. Outside, hundreds of social movements and civil society organizations held the People’s Assembly, for the 99% whose voice would not be heard. They flew economy and often shared modest rooms. The first was the summit of money and power. The second, the summit of the rest of us.

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