THE IMF AS A POLITICAL ACTOR IN CRISIS MANAGEMENT: A THEORETICAL ASSESSMENT

Abstract

International financial crises are not merely periods in which economic imbalances intensify; they are also critical moments in which the roles and functions of international institutions are redefined. Such crises create a context in which the boundary between the discourse of technical intervention and 

political decision-making becomes increasingly blurred. The International Monetary Fund, particularly during crisis periods, emerges as one of the central actors of global economic governance due to its expanded intervention capacity andgrowing influence over decision-making processes. Although the IMF’s activities in times of crisis are often justified in terms of macroeconomic necessities, the programs it implements and the conditionality mechanisms it employs generatelasting political effects on states’ policy space. This article approaches the IMF not merely as a technical provider of stability in crisis periods, but as a political actor with specific interests, priorities, and discursive frameworks. The theoreticalframework developed through realist, neoliberal institutionalist, and critical perspectives demonstrates how IMF interventions during crises are interpreted in fundamentally different ways. The 2008 Global Financial Crisis and the COVID-19 crisis render visible the interaction between technical justifications and power relations in the IMF’s decision-making processes, showing that the institution operates not as a neutral regulator in crisis management, but as an influentialactor in the reproduction of the global economic order.