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95 Chapter 4 The Social Life of Debt T h i s c h a p T e r a na ly z e s the relations between microfinance and women by examining eight case studies. Taking governmentality as a formal structure of analysis, I examine how NGO loans with their accompanying norms intersect the lives of women who are also governed by rules and obligations. While debt ties multiple people together in mutually reinforcing reciprocities, it simultaneously reconstructs the fields within which individual borrowers are situated, and circumscribes the forms of conduct within these intersecting domains. In this integration of dependencies, the actions of distant people can and do have effects on the livelihoods of individual borrowers and their families. Thus, a breakdown at any point in this structure of linked lending produces multiple ripple effects on a dispersed group of people. The following eight narratives are intricate relationships of debt within a constantly changing landscape of rural social conditions that I identified in the last chapter: increased moneylending, proxy membership, inclusion of the middle class as beneficiaries, the weakening of social solidarity, failed market subjects, and heightened tensions over loan recovery. These case studies show how women borrowers were constrained within two competing dynamic structures—the loan-giving NGO and their families and kin groups, who also made claims on their loans. Narrative 1: Grameen Phone Ladies My first case study is from my research in 2007.1 The cell phone is the most ubiquitous symbol of modern technology in Bangladesh. The introduction of cell phone technology has revolutionized telecommunications in Bangladesh. In 1996, Grameen Bank was one of four companies authorized to sell cell phones in Bangladesh. By 2007, Bangla Link, Aktel, Warid 96 The Social Life of Debt Telecom, City Cell, Grameen Phone, and Teletalk all competed with Grameen Phone for rural consumers. As noted in chapter 3, the Grameen Polli Phone program is a joint venture between Grameen Phone and Grameen Bank, which cost-share different aspects of the Polli Phone operations. Grameen Phone has the responsibility of getting the network available outside of Bangladesh. They activate the phones and send the bills directly to Grameen Bank. Grameen Bank remains responsible for identifying the borrowers and collecting the payments on the loans. By outsourcing its administrative costs—the selection of borrowers and the recovery of payments—to the Grameen Bank, Grameen Phone has kept its operating costs low and has remained a very profitable institution.2 Grameen Phone ladies are carefully screened by Grameen Bank personnel . The following three factors were considered in choosing an applicant: payment history, location, and some fluency in English.3 Women with successful loan payment history—and whose husbands or family members were in retail business, or owned a shop in the market—were selected. At least one member in the borrower’s family must possess some knowledge of English to recognize the letters and numbers on the phone. The selection process tended to benefit the better-off members within the group. The Polli Phone program operated on the following basis. With the loans, the women purchased the cell phone, battery charger, SIM card, antenna, etc. These phones either stayed with the women in their homes or, if the family owned a retail shop in the market, the husband or an adult son handled the phone business. The women with the cell phones in their homes operated as rural telephone kiosks. The customer came to them and rented the phone by the minute to make calls. They also received calls from people who wanted to talk to their relatives in the village. In those cases, the phone operator asked the caller to call back within a stipulated time while she sent someone to locate the person. For this additional service of locating the person, she charged a small fee. In the early days of the program, phone ladies often had customers coming to their house late at night to make phone calls to their relatives living overseas. This trend has declined as more rural people have access to mobile phones, and fewer have to travel any distance to make phone calls. In the peak of Polli Phone between 2001 and 2005, the women I met had run successful businesses. I found that these women shared features that I have noted as autonomy within family and a certain market savoir faire. Either they were heads of their households or their husbands had [18.118.254.94] Project MUSE (2024-04-19...

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