No abstract

Summary Impact evaluation studies routinely find that lending to women benefits their households. However, a number of them also find that this may not empower the women concerned. This seemingly paradoxical conclusion is confirmed by our study with respect to a lending program in rural India....

The impact that microcredit has on women's empowerment has been much debated in the literature. Some studies find negative effects; some find positive effects and others no effect. A reconciliation of these discrepancies has been attempted by attributing them to the usage of different measures...