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Yunus ideas being exported to Scotland

Yunus ideas being exported to Scotland

By Professor Cam Donaldson

Another example of the global influence of the ideas of Nobel Peace Laureate, Professor Mohammad Yunus is exemplified by the action and research agendas that are now formulating in countries like the United Kingdom. In Scotland, in particular these ideas, along with an accompanying research agenda on microcredit and social business is taking route.

A unique opportunity

Recent global trends present a unique opportunity to build a distinctive programme of research at an unusual point in time for Western societies. Although societies in lower-income countries have been re-thinking human and economic development from the bottom up for some time, advanced economies are now thinking about developing new solutions to persistent, stubborn and widening gaps between best and worst off in terms of health. Such inequalities are compounded by continuing high rates of deprivation, unemployment, worklessness and financial exclusion in the poorest communities. Many parts of the UK suffer disproportionately from such challenges, and we do not yet know how best to address them. As the ‘sick man of Europe', Glasgow, the City in which my University is located, exemplifies such challenges.

Microcredit and social business are exemplars of potential solutions. Built on notions of community development, the former has grown into a multi-national, multi-billion-dollar industry over the past 30 years. Only recently has it expanded into middle and higher income economies. Globally, little is known about longer-term impacts of microcredit on health and well-being, and even less about social business in such terms. Our University, therefore, has established the Yunus Centre to address such knowledge gaps by:

• conducting collaborative research line with Glasgow Caledonian's mission of the ‘common weal', thus aiming to improve life chances of the poorest members of society internationally;
• developing an original research programme around the notion of microcredit and social business as social, economic and public health interventions;
• developing new research interfaces across disciplines and areas of expertise, such as health economics, financial exclusion, public health, social business and microcredit; and
• building a high-quality core programme of research combined with significant international collaborations, facilitated by the University's strong community links, its growing global network of partner Universities and the place of GCU in the ‘Grameen family'.
As community-based interventions, addressing material circumstances and promotion of self-reliance, a research programme aimed at development and evaluation of microcredit and social business interventions would address in a holistic fashion the challenges of poverty, place and empowerment that bedevil many pockets of Western Society.

The research pillars

The programme of research and capacity building in the Yunus Centre for Social Business & Health at GCU will be built initially on two pillars:

• Evaluating Grameen microcredit entities in the UK. This presents a unique opportunity to build datasets on cohorts of Grameen customers' right from the beginning of these operations in their different geographical contexts. We would, first, assess ‘community readiness' for microcredit before moving to build a longitudinal study involving several hundred customers (of Grameen and relevant comparators) to assess the impacts on aspects such as outreach, levels and sources of income, health behaviours and measures of health and well-being.
• Microcredit, social business and well-being: laying the foundations. Given the lack of development of this whole area of research in academic environments, we would hope to lay the foundations for future capacity by establishing a multi-disciplinary PhD programme. Students would: address theoretical and conceptual foundations of microcredit and social business both in their own terms and as interventions for improving public health and well-being; test data collection instruments for future extensive evaluations; and conduct preliminary evaluations and case studies, especially of social business innovations. A network of such businesses is being built; preliminary research has commenced with one and discussions with others have indicated strong interests in mixed methods research using robust comparator groups.

Along with our third pillar of the Grameen Caledonian College of Nursing, based in Dhaka, and with the aim of providing a top-quality nursing education for young women from Bangladeshi rural communities, an exciting two-way partnerships in action and research is developing in which Scotland Bangladesh are learning from each other and with global implications.

Professor Cam Donaldson is the Yunus Chair in Social Business and Health at Glasgow Caledonian University