A/HRC/38/33 protection floor, according to the International Labour Organization (ILO), World Health Organization (WHO) and the United Nations, as demonstrated in the Social Protection Floor Initiative, reflects a human rights approach. 80 This is not, as many economists assume, a rigid one-size-fits-all approach that purports to have all the answers as to how hard choices on resource allocation are to be made. Rather, it identifies an overall set of objectives and offers elements of an accountability framework. Thus, while the Initiative views social protection in terms of human rights, the scope and coverage of each State’s floor is nationally defined while respecting principles such as non-discrimination, gender equality and social inclusion. The aim is to ensure universal protection, but that does not mean that every person receives the same benefit. Rather, the goal is to prevent or alleviate poverty, vulnerability and social exclusion, and the floor should include basic social security guarantees for health care, as well as income security for children, older persons and those unable to work, especially in cases of sickness, unemployment, maternity and disability. 36. By contrast, the social safety net approach generally adopted by IMF is often so minimal that it barely warrants the term “social protection”. In the words of the Independent Evaluation Office, the view of IMF is that “[s]ocial safety nets are necessary to mitigate adverse short-term effects of fiscal adjustment, economic reforms, or external shocks on vulnerable population groups”.81 In essence, social protection is a short-term fix to help the “most vulnerable” to overcome temporary economic hardship. Often, that group is not coterminous with the worst-off in society, but with those hit by the economic adjustments IMF is promoting. Furthermore, affordability is the overriding consideration, defined in almost circular terms that assume that responsible fiscal consolidation will be unable to provide a genuine floor to ensure the survival of those living in extreme poverty. The interest of IMF is in mitigation, not transformation, and social protection is embraced for largely pragmatic programmatic considerations, rather than for the principled reason that any macroeconomic framework should protect those who cannot protect themselves. 37. The World Bank, the key international supporter of the safety net approach as a form of social risk management, 82 has now formally endorsed the ILO/WHO/United Nations social protection floor approach, and IMF would normally be expected to follow suit. Targeting 38. For practical purposes, the main debate between proponents of “safety nets” and “social protection floors” concerns the principle of “targeting”, the idea that only the “most vulnerable” should benefit from redistribution in the form of in-kind and cash benefits. IMF “has been a strong proponent of targeting”,83 especially in analyses of income inequality, 84 public expenditure reform 85 and energy subsidy reform. 86 Indeed, it often seems to be treated as an end in itself. Since 2009, only 15 per cent of IMF fiscal consolidation programmes for low-income countries has required the protection of vulnerable groups, and most of the relevant conditionalities “focused on improving the targeting […] of the social safety net”.87 39. IMF has also strongly opposed universal programmes in some situations. Thus in 2017, after years of pressure from IMF, 88 Mongolia agreed to restrict the scope of the previously universal “Child Money” programme offered to the poorest 60 per cent of its 80 81 82 83 84 85 86 87 88 12 ILO, Social Protection Floors Recommendation, 2012 (No. 202). IMF, The IMF and Social Protection, p. 11. World Bank, World Development Report 1990: Poverty (1990), p. iii. IMF, The IMF and Social Protection, p. 11. IMF “Fiscal Policy and Income Inequality”, p. 25. IMF, “Public Expenditure Reform: Making Difficult Choices” (April 2014), p. 32. IMF, “Energy Subsidy Reform: Lessons and Implications” (January 2013), p. 30. IMF, “Social Safeguards”, p. 16. Independent Evaluation Office, “The IMF and Social Protection: Seven Low-Income Country Cases” (July 2017), p. 41, according to which “The IMF consistently favored targeted (means-tested) benefits over the universal Child Money entitlement”.