Women and Money: Lessons from Senegal Isabelle Gue´rin ABSTRACT This article examines the complexity and diversity of women’s informal financial practices using data from surveys conducted in Senegal. It suggests that these practices are at the centre of a constant dialectic between short-term and long-term horizons, between the requirements of daily survival and the demands of community solidarity, and between personal aspirations and collective constraints. These practices also clearly illustrate a desire among the women in Senegal to impose a form of financial self-discipline, and to create situations that will oblige them to earn income. The socio-economic diversity among these entrepreneurs is also underscored. Informal financial arrangements are both a product and producer of gender inequalities and inequalities among women, as reflected in the research. This has direct policy implications, especially for microfinance products. If they are to be effective, microfinance services must develop beyond a standard, one-size fits all model and become more innovative and adaptable to the diverse demands of women. They must be combined with complementary measures that challenge the systemic causes of inequality. Microfinance programmes should draw on informal financial arrangements while challenging their tendency to perpetu- ate inequality. INTRODUCTION In 2004, the G8 confirmed the importance of microfinance as a development tool against poverty, putting it at the forefront of the strategies described in the G8 action plan of June 2004. 1 The year 2005 was declared ‘the Year of Microfinance’ by the United Nations. Clearly, microfinance services (that is, savings, credit, insurance and remittances that target those who are excluded from formal financial and banking institutions) are considered a key development tool, particularly for women who are the target of most microfinance programmes. The author would like to thank Eveline Baumann, Sole`ne Morvant, Mark Schreiner and Jean- Michel Servet for their useful comments on earlier drafts of this paper. The author also thanks warmly two anonymous evaluators for their patience and for their constructive criticisms. Responsibility for any remaining deficiencies is entirely that of the author. 1. See their website: http://www.g8usa.gov/d_060904a.htm Development and Change 37(3): 549–570 (2006). # Institute of Social Studies 2006. Published by Blackwell Publishing, 9600 Garsington Road, Oxford OX4 2DQ, UK and 350 Main St., Malden, MA 02148, USA