Building Economic Solidarity: Caribbean ROSCAs in Jamaica, Guyana, and Haiti

Caroline Shenaz Hossein ()
Additional contact information
Caroline Shenaz Hossein: York University

Chapter Chapter 5 in The Black Social Economy in the Americas, 2018, pp 79-95 from Palgrave Macmillan

Abstract: Abstract Caribbean women create rotating savings and credit associations (ROSCAs) to take care of the need of their communities when commercial banks and formalized financial alternatives fail to do so. Informal banking collectives are important because they are inclusive, locally driven institutions to meet the livelihood needs of people, particularly women. In this chapter, it shows the various ways that the Black women participate in the social economy through self-managed groups, called ROSCAs. This chapter examines five country cases in Jamaica, Trinidad and Tobago, Grenada, Guyana, and Haiti to show how ROSCAs not only build savings, community relations but also enable people to access large lump sums of cash to invest in their businesses. The Banker ladies are upholding ancient African traditions of collectivity to increase savings and to allow for lending opportunities.

Date: 2018
References: Add references at CitEc
Citations: View citations in EconPapers (2)

There are no downloads for this item, see the EconPapers FAQ for hints about obtaining it.

Related works:
This item may be available elsewhere in EconPapers: Search for items with the same title.

Export reference: BibTeX RIS (EndNote, ProCite, RefMan) HTML/Text

Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:pal:pfschp:978-1-137-60047-9_5

Ordering information: This item can be ordered from
http://www.palgrave.com/9781137600479

DOI: 10.1057/978-1-137-60047-9_5

Access Statistics for this chapter

More chapters in Perspectives from Social Economics from Palgrave Macmillan
Bibliographic data for series maintained by Sonal Shukla () and Springer Nature Abstracting and Indexing ().