Empowering the frailty: dissecting the role of microcredit

The present paper seeks to dissect the significance of micro-credit in empowering women. It starts with a brief discussion on the role of micro-credit in poverty alleviation in general, widely acclaimed in contrast to the top-down policies. The concept of empowerment is defined from different perspectives of power, feminism and personal autonomy in family framework before taking up the agency of micro-credit for analysis. Here we identify three contrasting ‘paradigms’ with different underlying aims and understandings and different policy prescriptions and priorities in relation to both micro-finance itself and to gender policy such as the feminist empowerment paradigm, the poverty alleviation paradigm and the financial self-sustainability paradigm. Though some evaluations paint a positive picture of the impact of credit programs on women's lives in that access to savings and credit can initiate or strengthen a series of interlinked and mutually reinforcing ‘virtuous spirals’ of empowerment, we take care not to ignore the practical difficulties involved. Also considered in this respect is the role of outside agencies in the empowerment process.women empowerment, micro-credit, power, poverty alleviation, family, autonomy

Microcredit, Food Security and Women Empowerment in Bangladesh

Food security is an important factor contributing to the socio-economic stabilization and development of Bangladesh. Though, the country has made a steady progress in the expansion of food production, but food insecurity is still a major problem mainly because of poverty. Various development strategies aimed at eliminating poverty are now combining the microcredit as one of the key sectors in their programs. Empirical studies provide convincing evidence that microcredit has had positive impacts on three important sectors of national development - the alleviation of poverty, the empowerment of women and the food security. This thesis scrutinizes the effectiveness and the capability of microcredit in enhancing women’s livelihood and empowerment in rural areas of Bangladesh. By using Sen’s Capability Approach and empirical data, this thesis represents the interaction of women’s livelihood and microcredit. Collecting data from qualitative sources, this thesis tries to evaluate if the poverty alleviation capacity of microcredit helps its participant to improve food security. The findings show that microcredit can enhance women’s capabilities in achieving food security by offering them diverse economic and social solution of their vulnerability. This thesis concludes that although microcredit is certainly not a magic formula for poverty alleviation, however, it can prove itself a beneficial tool in the fight against poverty and food insecurity

The effect of microcredit on women's control over household spending in developing countries: a systematic review

Background: Over the past three decades, microfinance activities have spread across the globe, reaching tens of millions of poor households with tailored financial services. Microfinance can best be described as a field of intervention rather than a particular instrument. Initially, microfinance usually meant microcredit for working capital and very small investments, but increasingly it has been broadened to include savings/deposits, a limited range of micro-insurance and payment services (including micro-leasing) as well as a somewhat broader range of credit products for more substantial investments. In this study we focused on microcredit activities, constituting the bulk of microfinance activities across the globe. Microcredit activities have affected the lives of clients and others in multiple ways. The most frequently reported types of effects of credit at individual, enterprise and household level are the following: income, expenditure smoothing, and poverty alleviation effects; business growth and employment effects; schooling effects; and effects in terms of women's empowerment. Despite the diversity in microcredit schemes, many share two characteristics: they target poor women and often rely on some type of group-based lending. Women's empowerment in relation to microcredit has been studied extensively within the context of this type of microcredit scheme. Most of these studies have been carried out in the context of microcredit group schemes in South Asia. It has been argued that access to microcredit can foster changes in individual attitudes of women (e.g. increased self-reliance), power relations within the household (e.g. control over resources) and social status. An important dimension of empowerment concerns women's control over household spending. The main assumption is that by providing credit to poor women, their direct control over expenditures within the household increases, with subsequent implications for the status of women and the well-being of women and other household members. Women's control over household spending is a frequently recurring aspect analyzed within the context of microcredit interventions, which allows us to study whether microcredit targeted at women affects women's control over household spending decisions and the circumstances in which this occurs. Despite the central and recurrent role across studies of this aspect of women's empowerment in relation to microcredit activities, there has been no previous review on this topic. The growing importance of microcredit has resulted in a vast number of research and evaluation studies, including impact studies. Consequently, the microfinance literature harbors a substantial number of synthesis studies which discuss a set of microcredit interventions and aim to generate overall conclusions on their effects. However, most of these studies face limitations in terms of depth of empirical assessment and the extent to which the identified effects can be attributed to microcredit. Moreover, methodological principles regarding comprehensive searches and principles of selection, coding, extraction and aggregation are often lacking in review studies. Partial exceptions are three recent systematic reviews which all differ in scope from the present one (Stewart et al., 2010; Duvendack et al. 2011; Stewart et al., 2012). The reviews respectively focus on microfinance (credit and savings) in Sub-Sahara Africa, microcredit worldwide, and microfinance worldwide (credit, saving and leasing). Overall, these reviews suggest that the effects of microcredit on women's empowerment are at best mixed. In part this can be explained by the heterogeneity in microcredit interventions, contexts and target groups. However, the existing reviews did not use statistical meta-analysis to synthesise evidence of effects, nor context-mechanism-outcome synthesis to understand the variation in effects. Objectives: The main objective of this study was to provide a systematic review of the evidence on the effects of microcredit on women's control over household spending in developing countries. More specifically, we aimed to answer two related research questions: 1) what does the impact evaluative evidence say about the causal relationship between microcredit and specific dimensions of women's empowerment (women'ss control over household spending); and 2) what are the mechanisms which mediate this relationship. We prioritise depth of analysis over breadth, thus the scope of this review is narrower than previous systematic reviews on microfinance (Stewart et al., 2010; Duvendack et al. 2011; Stewart et al., 2012). We focused on specific aspects of women's empowerment which allowed us to combine statistical meta-analysis and realist (context-mechanism-outcome) synthesis. Criteria for considering studies for this review: We included studies that analyzed the effects of microcredit schemes targeting poor women in low and middle income countries, as defined by the World Bank. Studies that did not include analysis on microcredit and the effect on one or more dimensions (specified in main body of the report) of women's control over household expenditures were excluded. Studies which gave evidence of addressing the attribution problem either through randomised design, quasi-experimental matching, or regression analysis, were included. In practice, women's control over household spending (as a key dimension of empowerment) is influenced by many different factors. By focusing on those studies which explicitly addressed the challenge of separating the effect of microcredit from other influencing factors, we developed what we consider to be the most credible evidence base for drawing conclusions about the effects of microcredit on women's control over household expenditures in different contexts. SEARCH STRATEGY We conducted a comprehensive search covering all relevant academic databases, internet search engines and web sites with published and unpublished research, and also carried out extensive manual searches of books and additional journals not included in electronic data bases (searches were concluded on December 31, 2011). We used back-referencing from recent studies as well as citation-tracking to identify additional relevant studies. Finally, authors of studies which we were unable to retrieve were contacted. In addition, we contacted experts on microcredit and women's empowerment for additional references which we might have missed. Search strategies in databases and journals were adapted for each source. Where possible we used the existing keyword indices of particular databases. In addition, we applied our own list of combinations of keywords covering all relevant terms relating to the independent variable (i.e. credit and its variations) and the dependent variable (i.e. dimensions of women's control over household spending, empowerment). Data collection and analysis: From the different searches we identified an initial number of 310 papers that were selected for full text examination. Eventually, 29 papers were retained for further analysis, corresponding to 25 unique studies. These 25 independent findings were included in the synthesis. However, based on a systematic risk of bias assessment we found that more than half of the included studies had high threats to internal validity. Moreover, only about half of the studies show a clear and coherent link between a theoretical framework on microcredit and women's control over household spending and empirical data analysis. It should be noted that reviewing and synthesizing quantitative results from studies is only one side of the coin. The other side is to understand what makes them work, or what prevents them from working. Consequently, we conducted a qualitative synthesis of the included studies, which focused on identifying the mechanisms which underlie the causal relationship between microcredit and women's control over household spending. RESULTS The results of the meta-analysis indicated that the effect sizes from experimental studies examining effects of microcredit on women's control over household spending are not statistically significantly different from zero. The effects from quasi-experimental studies are statistically insignificant overall, and at best of small magnitude for those studies assessed of being of high risk of bias. We conclude that there is no consistent evidence for an effect of microcredit on women's control over household spending. In the qualitative analysis, using Coleman's (1986, 1990) typology of mechanisms, we identified five different situational mechanisms and eight different action-formation mechanisms. Due to the combination of substantial heterogeneity in contexts (e.g. existing gender relations) and interventions (e.g. microcredit versus microcredit and additional services), and the lack of information in the studies on this heterogeneity, it was not possible to go beyond the identification of mechanisms, in terms of generating empirically tested articulated theories of change which are representative beyond a specific study context. Authors' conclusions: In line with three recent other reviews on microfinance (Stewart et al., 2010; Duvendack et al., 2011; Stewart et al. 2012) we found that the microcredit evidence base is extensive, yet most studies are weak methodologically. From those studies deemed comparable and of minimum acceptable quality, we concluded that overall there is no evidence for an effect of microcredit on women's control over household spending. Women's control over household resources constitutes an important intermediary dimension in processes of women's empowerment. Given the overall lack of evidence for an effect of microcredit on women's control over household resources it is therefore very unlikely that, overall, microcredit has a meaningful and substantial impact on empowerment processes in a broader sense. While impacts on empowerment may appear to have occurred in particular studies, the high risk of bias of studies providing positive assessments suggests that such findings are of limited validity. Our conclusions on the effects of microcredit on empowerment are also in line with previous systematic reviews by Duvendack et al. (2011) and Stewart (et al. 2010) who report to a limited extent on empowerment effects. Consequently, there appears to be a gap between the often optimistic societal belief in the capacity of microcredit to ameliorate the position of women in decision-making processes within the household on the one hand, and the empirical evidence base on the other hand. However, our review markedly differs from previous reviews in two regards. First, we specifically focused on microcredit and women's empowerment captured through women's control over household expenditures. Second, as a result of this narrower focus, we were able to conduct statistical meta-analysis and extract behavioral mechanisms which can help to explain why and how microcredit can make a difference. The advantage of our approach was that the identified mechanisms all stem from studies which show evidence of addressing the attribution problem. Consequently, we can be quite confident of the insights that they provided on the effects of microcredit on women's control over household spending for particular populations of microcredit female clients and their families. Those studies that showed evidence of addressing the attribution problem were relatively weak on underlying theory. Moreover, they often lacked essential information such as the nature of the intervention and how it related to empowerment (e.g. how solidarity groups affect empowerment processes) or the slowly evolving gender relations in different contexts (e.g. the evolution of societal norms and the relationship with power relations in the household). A next logical step would be to undertake a systematic review of qualitative studies which often provide rich and context-specific information on microcredit and women's decision-making power in the household. Such a review should ideally build on the mechanisms identified in the present review and would bring us closer to uncovering credible theories of microcredit and the circumstances in which it may change women's decision-making power

Indonesian Women and Islamic Economy: A Case Study of Islamic Microfinance and Women's Empowerment in Yogyakarta

Baitul Maal wat Tamwil (BMT), a model of Islamic microfinance institution (IMFI), has emerged in Indonesia in the last two decades. Although BMTs were not initially created for women, they have embraced women as their primary beneficiaries. The main objective of this study is to examine the link between BMTs and women's empowerment. More specifically, this study aims to address three main problems. First, to observe the origins of BMTs and their affiliation, it investigates their institutional missions and their ties with women's empowerment agendas. Second, it analyzes the particular patterns with which BMTs' empower women clients. Third, to investigate the effects of BMTs' services on women. Employing a qualitative approach, this study explores four BMTs operating in Yogyakarta Special Region, Indonesia. Data were collected through semi-structured interviews, focus group discussions, document review, and field observations. Participants included BMT managers, founders, and staffs, as well as women clients and experts. This study has three main findings. First, although the majority of BMTs in Yogyakarta predominantly deal with women, from a historical perspective, there is no indication that the BMT movement in this region is related to a women's empowerment agenda. Moreover, none of the BMT institutions in this research specify women in their goals, objectives, or operations. Targeting of women as primary beneficiaries is merely intended for financial sustainability and not gender concerns. BMTs consider women to be 'a rational economic segment', who can enhance the efficiency of programs and contribute to organizational sustainability. Observing the four selected BMTs, it is found that the service orientation and character of each BMT is significantly affected by its primary affiliation. BMTs that are allied with Islamic mass organization are inclined to accentuate Islamic symbols, while BMTs that work with the government and/or international donors use such symbols less regularly. Second, this thesis demonstrates that women's empowerment in BMTs follows various models, dealing with socio-economic, religious, and environmental issues. For socio-economic empowerment, BMTs employ individual and collective empowerment. Individual empowerment, called jemput bola, is widely used by BMTs as their main means of maintaining personal relationships and member loyalty, as well as to oppose the conventional banking sector. This scheme requires BMTs to arrange rigorous meetings between clients and BMT officers. Meanwhile, collective empowerment is generally facilitated through the creation of independent groups of women based on proximity of residency. BMTs also use religious activities as instruments to deliver their mission of da'wah, to attract new members, and to monitor members' business performance. Supported by its international NGO's partners, one BMT institution has pioneered ecological projects that are integrated at the strategic level into its organizational mission and goals. Third, according to clients, the effects of BMT projects on their family and personal lives are mostly positive. Respondents reported that access to BMTs' programs andservices have fostered socio-economic and psychological benefits for women.Economically, positive outcomes have emerged from increased income, savings,and ownership as a consequence of business growth. Meanwhile, access to credit has given women social advantages, such as increased social mobility. Involvement in BMT programs has expanded women's ability to travel to places outside the province. In addition, women's participation in BMT projects has also had positive psychological contributions. Most respondents reported having more self-esteem and dignity as a result of their economic growth. The involvement of women inBMTs' religious programs also improves their religious knowledge and practice.Nevertheless, this study also demonstrates that BMTs may have a negative effect on women; one of the most apparent harmful effects of women's engagement in BMTs is their continuing dependence on loans. The importance of this study lies in several points: 1) It contributes a new understanding of the intersection between microcredit, women’s empowerment, religious and cultural problems in a Muslim-majority society. 2) There has been lack of research into the connection between the Islamic microfinance movement and women's issues in a historical and political context; this study helps fill such gaps by expanding the interdisciplinary scope of Islamic microfinance in an Indonesian setting. 3). The findings of this study enrich discussions and debates on Islamic financing and women's empowerment. This work provides the insight that women's empowerment is a universal concept that is applicable to Muslim-majority societies. 4) There has been a dearth of qualitative study studies on BMTs in Indonesia; this study addresses this gap by undertaking a qualitative approach. Future researchers could extend the research findings and reflections of this research and continue discussion of how to develop and integrate the aspects of gender, Islamic values, and microfinance. While this study has investigated the effects of BMT programs on women's lives, particularly in a Javanese setting, future researchers could expand this to the broader location and include the perspectives of spouses and other family members

Empowerment of women in poverty : report of ESCAP/Grameen Bank Regional Seminar, 7-9 July 1999, Dhaka

This report covers a regional overview of integrating gender concerns into macroeconomic and social policies, social mobilization for collective empowerment of women in extreme poverty, and effective empowerment mechanisma. Country presentations are given for 15 countries of Asia and the Pacific. It also contains a Regional Plan of Action for the Alleviation of Feminization of Poverty</p

Microfinance’s Impact on Education, Poverty, and Empowerment: A Case Study from the Bolivian Altiplano

This study explores the impact of microcredit on economic, educational, and empowerment levels of women from the Bolivian high plains who had acquired microcredit for over three years. Primary research was carried out with the help of a major NGO dedicated solely to microcredit. 100 in-depth personal interviews were conducted by the author in La Paz and El Alto from February to May 2007. This region was chosen because of the wide extent to which microcredit have been implemented here since the 1980s. The author created a control group from women who had never taken out a microcredit. The study employs the use of an established poverty scorecard to measure poverty levels over time. Using a comparative approach that allows a comparison between the independent control group and the loan group, the study finds that while the ownership of goods increased in the loan group, the benefits of microcredit on family educational attainment levels and empowerment are questionable. It is important to note that the vast majority of microcredit research does not use this type of independent control group.Microcredit, microfinance, empowerment, development, women, Bolivia.

Money for Nothing, Re-thinking Women's Empowerment and the Accomplishments of Microfinance in Rural Bangladesh

Microfinance Institutions often claim that microfinance is useful not only in alleviating poverty but also as a development tool which empowers women. The impacts of microfinance on empowerment have been studied by many, some of whom have reviewed empowerment not only by looking at repayment, but also by examining the women’s well-being. However, other studies suggest that the various dimensions of well-being (such as mobility, political participation and health awareness) are not a direct result of access to credit or income but rather an indirect result of community development programs that are usually run by the microfinance institutions alongside their credit providing facilities. Thus, many studies suggest, while microfinance may be a useful tool to alleviate women out of poverty but empowerment is an issue that needs to be addressed differently. Empowerment, in this view, requires incorporating women’s agency. However, in traditional societies like Bangladesh, the present character of women’s agency is one of the causes of their disempowerment. The existing social structure and the century-long gender disparities distort the view of what women really value. Thus, I argue that empowerment cannot be achieved only via exercising agency, but it needs to question the existing power relations and social structures. On this reasoning empowerment requires critical agency. By examining Bangladeshi women’s identity, social structure and agency this thesis inspects how social structures, existing power relations and agency play out in the context of empowerment. I argue that the microfinance institutions need to challenge the existing social structures and power relations rather than build on them. Moreover, the idea of critical agency needs to be incorporated in their community development programs to play an effective role in women’s empowerment and development. Looking at microfinance institutions in this broader context shows more clearly the limited role they play in the process of women’s empowerment

The weight of institutions on women's capabilities

The objective of this paper is to assess the links between institutions and quality of life, within Nussbaum's capability framework approach, exploring a relevant empirical issue: microfinance. Microfinance appears more and more as a tool for women's empowerment. Available results of impact studies call for circumspection; microfinance can free women from certain links of dependence. But microfinance can also forge new kinds of dependence and subordination, thereby strengthening the disparities between men and women, but also among women themselves.microfinance, capabilities, institutions, Martha Nussbaum, Amartya Sen, women, empowerment

Poverty Alleviation Programmes for Women in Lagos State, Nigeria: An Examination of the Implementation Strategies

The study examined the programmes of poverty alleviation and women empowerment in Lagos State; and evaluated the poverty alleviation implementation strategies in Lagos State Ministry of Women Affairs and Poverty Alleviation. Primary data were collected through the administration of questionnaire and conduct of in-depth interviews. The study population of 55,011 comprised staff and beneficiaries of the Ministry of Women Affairs and Poverty Alleviation (MWAPA). These included 162 staff and 54,849 beneficiaries according to the directories of the Ministry. Two-stage sampling technique was utilized. A sample size of eighty-one (81) respondents  (representing 50%  of the staff of the Ministry) while four hundred (400) beneficiaries of the Ministry that had benefited from the Ministry were sampled using Taro Yamane formula. In addition, in-depth structured interviews were conducted with 10 members of staff who were directly involved in skill acquisition programmes on programme performance and challenges facing the Ministry at reducing poverty in Lagos State. These included the Honourable Commissioner of the Ministry of Women Affairs and Poverty Alleviation; the Permanent Secretary; four Heads of Department (Women Department, Women Development Centre, the Planning, Research and Statistics Department, and Poverty department), and the assistant heads of the four departments mentioned while 10 beneficiaries were interviewed on programme performance and benefits derived from the Ministry. Data collected were analysed using percentage, mean, standard deviation, and relative impact index. The result showed that the strategies adopted by WAPA was that they monitor and follow-up beneficiaries regularly for effective performance (96.2%); the resources made available by Government in terms of human, financial and material are adequate for the smooth running of the programme (56.5%); Government adequately finances the procurement of tools and materials for the beneficiaries (78.2%); beneficiaries are given adequate vocational skills, training, and other WAPA programmes necessary before graduating(52.2%); entrepreneurship development programmes are regularly organised for the beneficiaries(39.1%); and is regular monitoring/follow-up by the WAPA officials(34.8%). The study concluded that the programmes of the Ministry of women affairs and poverty alleviation on poverty reduction and empowerment of women in Lagos State had been fairly successful. Key Words: Gender, Gender equality, Gender equity, Poverty, Poverty alleviation. DOI: 10.7176/RHSS/9-18-14 Publication date:September 30th 201

Empowering the frailty: dissecting the role of microcredit

The present paper seeks to dissect the significance of micro-credit in empowering women. It starts with a brief discussion on the role of micro-credit in poverty alleviation in general, widely acclaimed in contrast to the top-down policies. The concept of empowerment is defined from different perspectives of power, feminism and personal autonomy in family framework before taking up the agency of micro-credit for analysis. Here we identify three contrasting ‘paradigms’ with different underlying aims and understandings and different policy prescriptions and priorities in relation to both micro-finance itself and to gender policy such as the feminist empowerment paradigm, the poverty alleviation paradigm and the financial self-sustainability paradigm. Though some evaluations paint a positive picture of the impact of credit programs on women's lives in that access to savings and credit can initiate or strengthen a series of interlinked and mutually reinforcing ‘virtuous spirals’ of empowerment, we take care not to ignore the practical difficulties involved. Also considered in this respect is the role of outside agencies in the empowerment process