Bateman M. Why Doesn't Microfinance Work? The Destructive Rise of Local Neoliberalism

London: Zed Book, 2010. — 273 p. — ISBN: 9781848133310, 9781848133327, 9781848133334.This book is about one component of the global financial sector – microfinance – that in just thirty years has risen to become one of the most important policy and programme interventions in the international development community. As originally conceived, microfinance is the provision of tiny loans to poor individuals who establish or expand a simple income-generating activity, thereby supposedly facilitating their eventual escape from poverty.The central argument that is developed in this book, however, is that microfinance is largely antagonistic to sustainable economic and social development, and so also to sustainable poverty reduction. Put simply, microfinance does not work. There are some minor benefits to be derived from the widespread provision of microfinance to the poor. An intervention that puts a little extra cash into the hands of the poor in any community – and especially if that cash is brought in from outside the local community in question – could hardly do otherwise. But these benefits are very minimal indeed, and anyway wholly insignificant when set alongside the huge longer-term downsides and opportunity costs inherent in the operation of the microfinance model. To focus upon these few minor shorter-term benefits is to deliberately focus on the few trees left standing after having helped the entire forest to burn down.Acronyms.The rise of microfinance.
Microfinance myths and realities.
Microfinance as poverty trap.
Commercialization: the death of microfinance.
The politics of microfinance.
Alternatives to conventional microfinance.
Conclusion: the need for a new beginning.