ABSTRACT

This article provides a systematic literature review of growing research on microfinance, as promoted by scholars and policymakers in an entrepreneurial finance context. The results suggest promising opportunities for further research on microfinance in developed countries. Bibliometric analyses were used to identify three main dimensions of microfinance that guide academic research: social considerations, economic effects, and performance of microfinance institutions. Most literature focuses on developing countries, reflecting the success of microfinance as an instrument for promoting social and economic development. A keyword co-occurrence analysis reveals that financial inclusion and entrepreneurship domains remain empirically underexplored.

Acknowledgements

The views expressed in this article are those of the authors and do not necessarily represent the views of the institutions with which they are affiliated. The authors acknowledge financial, research and administrative support from the FCT (UBI PTDC/EGE/OGE/31246/2017).

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the author(s).

Notes on contributors

Serafim Gomes Nogueira is a Researcher in the School of Technology and Management, Polytechnic of Porto, Portugal.

Fábio Dias Duarte is a Professor at the School of Technology and Management, Polytechnic of Porto, Portugal, and a member of CIICESI (Center for Innovation and Research in Business Sciences and Systems of Information).

Ana Paula Matias Gama is an Assistant Professor at the Research Center in Business Sciences, University of Beira Interior, Covilhã, Portugal.

Notes

1 We used the association strength method to normalise the strength of the links between the cited references.

2 We used the association strength method to normalise the strength of the links between the keywords.

3 We unified plurals and singulars (e.g. businesses, business), removed hyphens (e.g. micro-credit, microcredit), acknowledged abbreviations (e.g. MFIs, microfinance institutions), and grouped synonyms (e.g. enterprise, business). We also grouped countries into developed or developing countries.

4 Every journal, book, or proceeding in the WoS core collection is linked to at least one of the 235 subject categories defined by the WoS.

5 According to Morduch (Citation1999a, 229), part of the success of Grameen Bank is due to support from the government, such that “In 1996, for example, total subsidies evaluated at the economic opportunity cost of capital amounted to about US$26–30 million.” Because of the social function of this sector, MFIs rarely function as solely private institutions.