This paper is one of a series of drafts for a study currently under preparation at ODI with the provisional title of The IMF and Developing Countries: Its Role in the 1990s. The completed report will review developments in the 1980s; examine the Fund as a source of finance and issues in its lending policies; review the theory and practice of IMF policy conditionality and of heterodox alternatives to it; and explore the future role of the Fund.

The purpose of this paper is to complement the quantitative multi-country results (see ODI Working Paper 47) with more qualitative case-study information. The information presented is based on a survey of studies relating to the experiences of seventeen developing countries which adopted IMF programmes in the 1980s.