Microfinance Challenges: Empowerment or Disempowerment of the Poor?

Contents: Editors and scientific advisory committee. List of authors. Acknowledgments. General introduction/Isabelle Guerin and Jane Palier. I. Questions as to definition: what is understood by empowerment?: Introduction: Definition the concept of empowerment through experiences in India/Jane Palier. 1. \'Engendering\' microfinance/Meera Sundararajan. 2. Relevance of microfinance and empowerment in tribal areas: a case study of the Konda Reddis/M. Thanuja. 3. Structural issues in empowerment under microfinance/Sreejata Banerjee and S.J.S. Swamidoss. 4. Empowerment and microfinance: an analysis of theoretical concepts and practices--Reflections from a microfinance project in Indonesia/Wayan Suadnya, Shankariah Chamala, Muktasam Abdurahman and Rosiady Sayuti. 5. Historical analysis of empowerment and its present understanding in the context of microfinance/Sunita Rabindranathan. 6. Micro enterprises of self-help groups and state policies under a neo-liberal regime: evidences from a village in Kerala/S. Mohanakumar and Suja Susan George. 7. Can microfinance empower women?/Joy Deshmukh-Ranadive. Reference. Part I: II. Microfinance in its environment: Introduction: Analysing microfinance as a process of endogenous development/Isabelle Guerin. 8. Situating microcredit in India: some reflections/K. Kalpana. 9. Women\'s survival strategies and experiences with support services as home-based micro-entrepreneurs in Metro Manila/Christine Bonnin. 10. Microfinance, informal finance and empowerment of the poor: lessons from a case study of the SHG-bank linkage programme in a backward district in India/R. Sunil. 11. Emerging women micro-entrepreneurs in Bangladesh: the "missing middle"/Parveen Mahmud. 12. Microfinance technology and linkages with non-financial services/Arun Raste. Reference. Part II: III. Assessing microfinance: Introduction: Assessing the impact of microfinance in terms of empowerment: issues and challenges/Cyril Fouillet and Jane Palier. 13. Microfinance, rural livelihoods and women\'s empowerment -- a participatory learning system to assess and enhance impact/Helzi Noponen. 14. Microfinance and women\'s empowerment: research approach and findings from an impact assessment of MFIs in India/Meenal Patole and Frances Sinha. 15. Self-help groups and the empowerment of women -- a study on Community Development Society in Alleppey, Kerala/Binita V. Thampi. 16. Microfinance and self-help groups -- the way ahead (with special reference to Kanyakumari district)/Usha Oommen and A. Meenakshisundararajan. 17. Findings from the mid-term impact assessment study of the CASHE programme in Orissa, carried out by SAMPARK, Bangalore/Prabhat Labh. 18. Microfinance and empowerment -- concepts and tools: some preliminary insights from the SHG model in Andhra Pradesh/P.A. Lakshmi Prasanna. 19. SHGs and their place and role in civil society/Prakash Louis. 20. Social externalities of women\'s empowerment through microfinance: a comparative study of two interventions/M. Indira. 21. Empowerment of SHG/DWCRA women through microfinance: a study in Andhra Pradesh/D. Vasudeva Rao. 22. Microcredit programmes, poverty alleviation and empowerment of women -- some empirical evidence from Kerala/K.R. Lakshmi Devi. 23. From passive participation to effective leadership: a study on empowerment of women in Dakshina Kannada, India/Uday Kumar. Reference. Part III: By way of conclusion: microfinance, empowerment and solidarity-based economy/Isabelle Guerin and Jane Palier.

"Microfinance is often presented, not only as an efficient tool to fight against poverty, but also as a means of promoting the empowerment of the most marginalized sections of the population, especially women. However, reality has shown that the causal relation between microfinance and empowerment is neither linear, nor unequivocal and that it is even less systematic. This book is an attempt to nourish the debate, on the one hand, by combining theoretical reflections and case studies, and on the other hand, by engaging practitioners and researchers from various backgrounds (mainly economists, sociologists and anthropologists). First of all, we consider the question of definitions. Even if everyone agrees that the concept of \'empowerment\' refers to notions of choice, of power and of change, the diversity of definitions suggested here confirms that under no circumstances does a universal conception of it exist. The second part insists on the central role of the environment. The link between microfinance and empowerment is all the more subtle, and sometimes unforeseeable, as microfinance projects take place within an economic, socio-cultural and political context that is itself complex, evolutionary and which partially conditions the results obtained. Microfinance projects -- as any development projects -should therefore be understood and analyzed as endogenous processes. Finally, a third part relates to the crucial question of evaluation. Here still, the diversity of the results is striking: certain experiments are very positive while elsewhere the results are very mixed and sometimes even worrying. One does not speak any more of empowerment, but of "disempowerment" or even "over-empowerment". This heterogeneity of results is due as much to the diversity of the projects, their methods of action, the target population, and the context of intervention as to the methodologies of evaluation. The conclusion leads us to go beyond a certain number of contradictions evoked throughout the book while proposing to think of empowerment using the French concept of "solidarity-based economy". This concept of solidarity-based economy, which is theoretical as well as normative, is a framework for analysis and action, which, according to us, must make it possible to guard against the risks of failures and perverse effects mentioned throughout the book.