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It’s lingered quite a while in the pipeline. My book The Political Economy of Microfinance: Financializing Poverty is finally due to hit shelves in June – so says the publisher. This book makes the enigmatic microfinance sector more understanable by tracing its evolution and showing what it is today: a leading edge of financialisation where the world of global poverty meets the world of global finance.
The book is the product of several years of research at the Max Planck Institute for the Study of Societies in Cologne. In 2008, I set out to investigate the connection of microfinance with water and sanitation, which brought me to southern India. Then the Andhra Pradesh microfinance crisis happened, and this eye-opener led me to re-examine microfinance more broadly and fundamentally, critically evaluate it as a highly remunerative but crisis-prone financial system (no longer a development intervention), and challenge its most basic premise: that poverty is a problem of finance.
I’m already excited about whatever reactions (critical, or otherwise) may follow when my ideas, analysis and critique finally reach a broader audience. To give some indications of what the book says and does, I’m posting excerpts from The Political Economy of Microfinance here over the next few months.
Here’s the first. Read the rest of this entry »
One of the things that make blogs particularly interesting are series. The “series” series recommends series at related blogs.
Logo of the AoM Interest Group Strategizing, Activities & Practices
For some time now, the digital revolution has reached and changed everyday research practices. There is hardly any part of the research process for which no digital tool is available, starting from creating a mind map of your first idea (e.g. “Freemind”) over collecting (e.g. “Sitesucker”) and coding your data (e.g. “WebQDA”) to collaboratively annotating and writing (e.g. “eLaborate”). And while many of these digital tools require substantial financial investments, a growing number of tools is available open access and free of charge.
governancexborders.com 