Philanthropy and Non-Profit Organizations

Today our democracy is flooded with money—currency that gives wealthy interests undue power and influence in our legislative process. But our democracy can run, and should run, on a different kind of currency. Currency can be more than just money; the efforts of moneyed interests to the contrary notwithstanding, our democracy is about more than just money. At its core, our democracy is about people, it’s about activism, and it’s about heart.

The study of the relationship between migration and development has found a new audience in the last decade. Much of the interest on this topic stems from a rapid growth in economic remittance flows, which have caught the attention of political, multilateral, and academic actors. An Inter-American Development Bank (IDB) report estimated that the Latin American region received $20 billion in remittances in the year 2000 alone.¹ While the IDB and other development institutions explore ways to effectively manage these financial flows, academic scholars of migration are increasingly focused on understanding the real impact of such remittances on development. An equally important dimension of these discussions is the social and cultural implication of remittances.² Often overlooked by financial institutions, the ideas, practices, identities, and social capital that migrants remit home also contribute to the intricate relationship between migrants and their home communities.³

Microfinance has proven to be an effective tool in promoting sustainable economic development in the poverty-stricken Third World. Recently, it has also shown itself to be a viably profitable enterprise. Large commercial banks have begun to enter the microfinance sector by “downscaling” their services such as lending and savings accounts to low-income clients.