Mutualist Microfinance : Informal Savings Funds from the Global Periphery to the Core?

Abstract

As ye sow, so ye shall reap! 67 Kasmoni in Suriname Aspha Bijnaar 4. Tontines and village cash boxes along the Tilogne-Dakar-Paris emigration route 97 Abdoulaye Kane 5. Social security in financial self-help organizations 121 An Indonesian example Hotze Lont 6. Changing financial mutuals in urban India 151 Practice, functions, trust and development trajectories Peer Smets 7. Varieties of mutualism 183 Marcel van der Linden Contributors 211 Index 213 Smets. Of course, the scholarly community of the Amsterdam School for Social Research (ASSR) over the years and in many seminars greatly contributed to the ideas in this book. Organizational and technical assistance came from José Komen and Hans Sonneveld, also of the ASSR, and Marianne Bernard, secretary at the University Professors' office. The translators, finally, helped to lift this text across the language barrier: Beverly Jackson translated the chapter by Abram de Swaan, Lee Mitzman translated the chapters by Bijnaar and Kane, Stijn van der Putte translated the final essay by Marcel van der Linden and Phyllis Mitzman did the final corrections for the other chapters. But the greatest input, of course, came from all those people who let the researchers in on a most private aspect of their lives: their financial dealings with one another, their saving and their spending, and all the ideas, sentiments, deceptions and expectations that came with it. It is to them that this book is dedicated.

Microsavings and market saturation: the evolution of diversity in saving products

“…Such funds may serve savings, credit, and insurance functions. Motivations include risks associated with hoarding, eliminating the need to maintain large sums in one place, little paperwork, no authorizations, keeping money away from relatives and submitting to social pressure to save, as well as possibilities to receive the sum earlier in case of an emergency (Swaan and Linden, 2005). However, such informal funds existed even in the 19 th century in Europe, but by and large they disappeared with the spread of government and commercial financial institutions (Swaan, 2005).…”