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Lesson 12 min 20 XP

HIPC and Debt Relief

The campaign to cancel developing world debt, the HIPC initiative, and the Jubilee 2000 movement that changed the politics of debt.

The Jubilee Movement

By the 1990s, the human cost of developing world debt had become impossible to ignore. Many of the world's poorest countries spent more on debt service than on health and education combined. Mozambique spent 33% of government revenue on debt service. Tanzania's debt payments exceeded its entire health budget while AIDS was devastating the country.

The Jubilee 2000 campaign, inspired by the biblical concept of periodic debt forgiveness, mobilized millions. A petition with 24 million signatures was delivered to the G8 summit. Bono, the rock star turned debt activist, and economist Jeffrey Sachs brought the issue to mainstream attention. Pope John Paul II called for debt cancellation as a moral imperative. The campaign transformed debt from a technical financial issue into a moral one, shifting political dynamics at the G7 and within the Bretton Woods institutions.