Social Dimensions of Banking: the Example of the Grameen Bank

Crisis makes us look for a new model of economic activity based on social solidarity. Muhammad Yunus, Bengali economist and Peace Nobel Prize winner, the father of microfinance and originator of a new social business concept, has become an advisor to European Commission. Author of the paper describes the activities by Muhammad Yunus and his values. Yunus is convinced that there is place in the private sector to launch activities based on the free market, yet with a purpose to maximize social benefits. He describes such activities in the framework of “social business”, which he calls a missing element in the theory of the free market. The Grameen Bank, established by M. Yunus, remains the world’s largest social business. Further on, I analyze the financial market in Poland, and discuss if institutions of “social solidarity”, similar to Grameen Bank, have originated there. We have been accustomed to the stereotype of thinking about the rich and the poor, and of dividing society into those who work and the beneficiaries of social support. Quoting Yunus: “Because of this silence and indifference, banks have imposed a financial apartheid and gotten away with it. If economists would only recognize the power of socioeconomic implications of credit, they might recognize the need to promote credit as a human right.