This Policy Arena originates from two sessions of the NGO study group of the UK-based Development Studies Association in September 1997. The aim of these sessions was to explore the similarities and dierences between micro®nance experiences in dierent parts of the world, with a particular focus on what has been learnt in the South' and in the North' and whether there were any speci®c lessons which were transferable across these conventional divides.
Replacing developed' and developing' with North' and South' is an improvement because it reaches beyond the notion of an inevitable process of progressive change. However, because of the immense diversity of contexts within both, South and North are best conceived of as metaphors (Eyben, 1988, 1). All of the articles here emphasize the extreme care that needs to be exercised in using the terms North and South particularly if one is really talking about experiences in speci®c countries, for example, Bangladesh or the UK.
Micro®nance is concerned with delivering small loans, accepting low levels of savings deposits, and providing insurance and other ®nancial services to which poor people often lack access. The way it is done has varied historically and across countries. These dierent contexts in¯uence the success or otherwise of speci®c technologies (or designs) used for delivering services. Two of the articles in this collection stress this point (see Pearson on peer collateral and Rogaly on cooperatives and mutuals). The dierent technologies vary in terms of how much they cost the institutional providers of micro®nance Ð including the often ignored costs of encouraging users to