SARAH SCHERFF/Photo Editor
BRITTANY YEAROUT
Perspectives Editor
Imagine a museum dedicated to poverty the way museums are dedicated to dinosaurs. Dr. Muhammad Yunus, 2006 Noble Peace Prize Winner, ended his Saturday lecture, “Social Enterprise: Doing Well by Doing Good,” with that unusual image.
The lecture was held at the Pepperdine Law School in the Caruso Auditorium where Yunus provided insight into poverty, the problems with the conventional banking system and the Grameen Bank, which he started in 1983. The bank gives micro-loans to the poor in Bangladesh so that they can start and grow small businesses.
More than 500 people attended the lecture, which spilled into three overflow rooms where people watched a live feed from the auditorium.
“The lecture was inspirational, cutting edge and instructional on how microfinance is changing the world,” said Janet Kerr, Founder and Executive Director of the Geoffrey H. Palmer Center for Entrepreneurship and the Law.
Yunus was awarded the 2006 Nobel Peace Prize for leading the way in microcredit. Grameen Bank is considered the opposite of the conventional banking system, providing small amounts of money to the poorest of the poor, particularly women, and is built on mutual trust, accountability, participation and creativity, according to its official Web site, http://www.grameen-info.org/index.html.
Today Grameen Bank has lent a total of $6.44 billion in loans to 7.27 million borrowers. The bank has grown to 2,459 branches, employs 24,163 people and works in 79,539 villages covering more than 95 percent of the total villages in Bangladesh.
Yunus told the Pepperdine audience that poverty is not created by poor people and it is not their fault.
“Poverty was created by the system we built, all the institutions that we built, all the framework that we created, all the concepts that we built, that is where the seed of poverty is and that poverty that we see is the reflection of what we have done in our society,” Yunus said. “Poverty is an imposition on people; it is an artificial imposition on people. Human beings have enormous potential, unlimited potential, but simply they cannot bring it out.”
Yunus used an example of a bonsai tree to explain his assertions. The bonsai is a tree in a flower pot that is small, not because there is something wrong with the seed – the seed is perfect – but because people plant it in the “wrong” place; it needs a huge space to grow, Yunus said.
“And poor people are bonsai people, there is nothing wrong with their seed simply society never gave them the space so that they could grow,” Yunus said. “If they had the right space they would be as tall as anybody else, and that is what the new generation of young people coming out of the poor families have demonstrated very clearly.”
With such a serious topic, Yunus used humor to lighten the mood of the audience. Before Grameen Bank was founded and he was experimenting with the project, he simply gave money to poor from his pocket.
“They look at me in a strange way, they look at me as if I descended from heaven. In the beginning I was a little puzzled but then I thought: if you can become an angel for $27, it as an opportunity to do more and become some kind of super angel,” Yunus said. “The question that came to my mind is: if you can make so many people so happy, with such a tiny amount of money, why shouldn’t you do more.”
Yunus started Grameen Bank in Bangladesh because of the conventional banking system’s reluctance to help the poor. The conventional banking system is unjust because it refuses to give money to the poor people and because it refuses to give money to women, Yunus said.
From the beginning, one of the main principles of Grameen Bank has been to help women. Today 97 percent of the poor who borrow money are women, but Yunus said it hasn’t always been this way.
The women used to turn down money from Grameen Bank, Yunus said.
“When a woman says ‘no I don’t want to take the money’, it is not her voice, it is the voice of the fear,” Yunus said. “Fear that has surrounded her for years and years and hundreds of years. You don’t expect that fear just to disappear overnight because you gave her money. It takes time and lots and lots of patience.”
With such success in Bangladesh, Yunus has decided to bring the first Grameen Bank concept of microcredit to the United States. The company will be located in Queens, New York, where it can test ideas and expand.
After Yunus spoke, the floor was open to questions and several pertained to how Grameen will function in the United States.
Yunus answered by saying that his bank has a lot of problems to work out. He added that a law needs to be made so that he can create a banking system that is inclusive and nobody is left behind, not even the beggars or the homeless.
“Isn’t it awkward, isn’t it humiliating that a country like the United States with such a state-of–the-art banking system still has pawn shops around the corner everywhere you go?” Yunus said. “Does this say good things about the banking system? … What kind of bank is it that denies the right to open an account so that I can put my $1000 check into the account and get $1000 back from the account?”
First year law student Adam Phillips said Yunus’ ideas were refreshing and that he was excited to hear him speak.
“His whole idea about bringing social enterprise and economic theory together to make a difference in the world is long overdue,” Phillips said.
In honor of Yunus, Kerr announced a $10,000 donation to start a microfinance fund at the law school. Melanie Howard, director of the Palmer center, pledged $1,000 for the effort
10-25-2007
