(Un)due Credit: Evaluating the Microfinance Craze

Abstract

Microfinance seeks to address the systemic global wealth inequalities that result from financial exclusion. Over the most recent decades, the constitution of the microfinance industry has shifted from primarily non-profit institutions to commercially funded, for-profit institutions. Although poverty alleviation impact assessments have been both inconclusive and conflicting, microfinance has continued to proliferate at a rapid rate, receiving enthusiastic accolades from the global development community. This anomaly is explored through an examination of the neoliberal paradigms that microfinance serves to reinforce. Though microfinance has maintained a progressive reputation, in practice it has proven to be a poverty alleviation tactic that fortifies the neoliberal status quo and the existing global economic order.