This chapter explores the controversial issue of how the microfinance sector has prized its way into the provision of public goods. Using a case study of water and sanitation in Andhra Pradesh, it delves into the contradictions involved in using credit to provide vital infrastructure.
Microfinance commodifies and privatizes these public goods, making access to them a private problem and bringing their governance closer to the financial market. Such projects serve to extend the reach of private finance into traditionally public goods, driven more by ideology than evidence.
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