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>Posted by Center Staff

This post by Alex Counts, President and CEO of Grameen Foundation, shares his thoughts in reading Dean Karlan and Jacob Appel’s book “More Than Good Intentions.” For more from Alex Counts, visit his blog where he describes the process of writing a book on Haitian microfinance pioneer Fonkoze. His post begins: 

Dean Karlan and Jacob Appel’s book More Than Good Intentions: Improving the Ways the World’s Poor Borrow, Save, Farm, Learn and Stay Healthy is a practical and important contribution to the popular literature about poverty alleviation and in particular, about the need to rigorously test assumptions in terms of what works, what does not, and how flawed but promising approaches can be improved. Despite its shortcomings, most of which relate to its treatment of microfinance, anyone interested in contributing their time, talent, or energy towards addressing one of the world’s most important problems – poverty – should read this book.

Some years ago I was in a weeklong seminar organized by Citigroup Foundation in Singapore that was attended by some 40 academics, practitioners and business leaders involved in financial services for the poor. From a previous encounter, I had been braced for Karlan to be critical of microfinance. While he did not entirely disappoint in that regard, his comments were more balanced and nuanced than I expected. Especially when the discussion strayed from microfinance, he was the most interesting person in the room. When he spoke, I got on the edge of my chair to make sure I heard him – and I don’t think I was alone. After that seminar, Grameen Foundation began working with Karlan and his colleagues, and we have benefitted from those collaborations.

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