Projekt

There is an ongoing debate on the impact of microfinance. While the first

randomized controlled trials find either underwhelming or weakly positive

evidence, the more recent experimental work on microfinance shows that tweaks

of the standard model may lead to different conclusions.

As with many interventions, the design space of a microfinance program is

highly dimensional. Not only the different components of the intervention, but

also who implemented it, may matter for the observed impact. In this study, we

will map the design space of a microfinance intervention and look into how

robust the results are across variations of the design space.

The aim of our study is twofold. First, we will provide a comprehensive

overview of the microfinance literature by conducting a deep literature review

and an expert survey with the authors of these studies. Second, using the

microfinance literature as an example, we will demonstrate the importance of

construct validity, and how variations of the design space may influence the

results obtained. This study fits within the broader debate about how we use

evidence generated by RCTs to draw conclusions about what works in a real-world

setting.

Projektstart:
01. Januar 2021

Projektende:
30. Juni 2024

Projektmitarbeitende:
Lise Masselus, Christina Petrik, Prof. Dr. Jörg Ankel-Peters