In the last decade, the agenda of policies of the World Bank has shifted from narrow macroeconomic reforms and structural adjustment to public sector reforms leading to "good government" and the empowerment of civil society. The objective of this essay is to obtain a broad understanding of the underlying political rationale of the new development agenda of the World Bank, concerning aspects of institutional capacity, participation, and improvement of social conditions. The argument to be developed is that the Bank has become more acutely aware that the success of its development framework depends on deep processes of social and political engineering. With its emphasis on improving social conditions and strengthening civil society, social services reforms advocated by the World Bank have the purpose of building a wide consensus, contributing to promote political stability and foster free market capitalism. In this sense, in spite of the rhetoric of a Bank of "apolitical development," its recent agenda implies a normative preference for specific attributes of Western variants of liberal democracy.
Governance; World Bank; State reform; Educational policy; Decentralization