An important volume that examines the highly contested subject of microcredit, showing how its increasing inefficiency and sub-prime nature has resulted in multiple crises.

Microcredit programmes, long considered efficient development tools, now face unprecedented crises in a number of countries. Is this the end of microcredit or rather an essential step in its expansion? Should we stop microcredit altogether or rethink the way it is implemented?

Drawing on extensive empirical research conducted in various parts of the world - from Morocco to Senegal to India - this important volume examines the whole chain of microcredit to provide the answers to these questions. In doing so, the authors highlight the diversity of crises, both in intensity and in nature, while also shedding light on a diversity of causes, be it microcredit organizations unprepared for massive growth, saturated local economies or greedy investors and shareholders attracted by profits. Crucially, the authors demonstrate that microcredit is not a monolithic project, and the crises should also be analysed in the light of national histories and policies.

An original and necessary intervention in what has become one of the most contentious topics within the development world.

A deeply informed, intelligent examination of microcredit. A once universally celebrated concept, the contributors point instead to a market-driven Hobbesian world of hyper-competition, with the poor made worse off than ever. An important and convincing read for anyone still seduced by the myths of microcredit.