Part Two - Resources

ORGANIZATIONS

Association for Enterprise Opportunity (AEO)
70 East Lake Street
Suite 1120
Chicago, IL 60601-5907
TEL: (312)357-0177
FAX: (312)357-0180
Email: aeochicago@aol.com
          www.wwa.com/~aeo/

AEO is the national association of organizations committed to microenterprise development in the United States, working toward the goal of helping one million low-income people to achieve self-sufficiency through self-employment by the year 2008.

The Calvert Social Investment Foundation
4550 Montgomery Ave.
Bethesda, MD 208145
TEL: (800)248-0337
        (301)951-4832
FAX: (301)654-2960
Email: foundation@calvertgroup.com
           www.calvertgroup.com/foundation

The Calvert Social Investment Foundation offers opportunities for socially responsible investors to invest in a number of microcredit and microenterprise development programs, and other community development organization.

Center for Policy Alternatives (CPA)
1875 Connecticut Avenue, NW
Suite 710
Washington, D.C. 20009
TEL: (202)387-6030
FAX: (202)986-2539
Email: bware@cfpa.org
           www.cfpa.org

CPA is a non-partisan, non-profit organization which develops policy proposals for economic development strategies, including microenterprise; it then provides avenues for collaboration between a network of public officials and members of the field.

Corporation for Enterprise Development (CFED)
777 N. Capital Street, NE
Suite 410
Washington, D.C. 20002
TEL: (202)408-9788
FAX: (202)408-9793
Email:cfed@cfed.org
          www.cfed.org

CFED fosters widely shared and sustainable economic well-being. It promotes asset-building strategies, primarily in low-income and distressed communities, through policy design and advocacy, project management, technical assistance, research and publications.

Ms. Foundation for Women
120 Wall Street
33rd Floor
New York, NY 10005-3904
TEL: (212)742-2300
FAX: (212)742-1653
Email:awadia@ms.foundation.org
          www.ms.foundation.org
The Ms. Foundation is a national multi-issue women's fund which provides technical assistance and funding to U.S.-based organizations engaged in microenterprise development with low-income women.

Self-Employment Learning Project
The Aspen Institute
1333 New Hampshire Avenue, NW
Washington, DC 20036
TEL: (202)736-5800
FAX: (202)467-0790
Email:peggy.clark@aspeninst.org
          www.aspen.inst.org

SELP is a research and evaluation effort which gathers new information about self-employment and about microenterprise as a poverty-alleviation and job-creation strategy in the United States.

INTERNET SITES

www.soc.titech.ac.jp/icm/
The Virtual Library on Microcredit. A repository of information on alternative, non-conventional financial systems and informal credit markets. Well designed, with lots of documents and case studies.

www.sbaonline.sba.gov/womeninbusiness/
The Small Business Administration's Office of Women's Business Ownership. Detailed information about networks of training, counseling and mentoring services to help women start and/or expand businesses.

www.slu.edu/eweb/
The Saint Louis University site on resources for entrepreneurship education. With how-to guides for entrepreneurs and many topical links.

www.EntreWorld.org/
EntreWorld is an online information resource for entrepreneurs and supporters of entrepreneurship. Presented by the Kauffman Center for Entrepreneurial Leadership.

PUBLICATIONS

Boshara, Ray, Friedman, Robert E., and Anderson, Barbara. 1997. Realizing the Promise of Microenterprise Development in Welfare Reform. Washington, D.C.: Corporation for Enterprise Development. 46 pp. (Guidelines for the employment of microenterprise development as a welfare-to-work strategy under recent federal welfare legislation)

Edgecomb, Elaine, Klein, Joyce, and Clark, Peggy. 1996. The Practice of Microenterprise in the U.S.: Strategies, Costs, and Effectiveness. ISBN Paper: 0-89843-196-4. Washington, D.C.: Aspen Institute. 80pp. (Documents the experience of seven microenterprise programs in delivering credit and training to low-income people)

Jones, Susan R. 1998. A Legal Guide to Microenterprise Development: Battling Poverty Through Self-Employment. Washington, D.C.: ABA Commission on Homelessness & Poverty (addresses legal issues facing micro-entrepreneurs in the U.S. and offers guidance to pro-bono lawyers who represent them and their sponsoring organizations).

Journal of Developmental Entrepreneurship. Norfolk State University School of Business and Entrepreneurship. Norfolk, VA 23504. (current studies on the public policy dimension of entrepreneurship).

Markley, Deborah and McKee, Katherine. 1992. Business Finance as a Tool for Development. Washington D.C.: Aspen Institute 79 pp. (A survey on the role of finance in economic development at the state level)

McLenighan, Valjean and Pogge, Jean. 1991. The Business of Self-Sufficiency: Microcredit in the United States. Chicago: Woodstock Institute. 53 pp. (Information about microcredit programs, including funding, operations, advocacy and policy recommendations.

Parzen, Julia Ann and Kieschnick, Michael Hall. 1992. Credit Where It's Due: Development Banking for Communities. Philadelphia: Temple University Press. 220 pp. (A thorough discussion of the rationale for several types of development finance institutions)

Self-Employment Learning Project. 1995. Microenterprise Assistance: What Are We Learning about Results? Washington, D.C.: Aspen Institute. 20 pp. (Provides information in bullet format on key findings from research conducted by the Self-Employment Learning Project).

Sherraden, Michael. 1991. Assets and the Poor. Armonk, N.Y.: M.E. Sharpe, Inc. 302pp. (A thoughtful proposal that welfare policy be focused on asset accumulation and ownership rather than on income and consumption)

DOWNLOADABLE RESOURCES

Download the following resources, prepared by the Access to Credit Media Project and its partners:

· Outreach Toolkit. A collection of ideas and materials which local organizers can use to promote To Our Credit, microcredit and microenterprise development, or their own organization's work for social change; prepared by the Access to Credit Media Project.
Download Adobe Acrobat Version

· AEO Policy Paper. The Association for Enterprise Opportunity's comprehensive analysis of social and economic issues surrounding microenterprise developoment, along with specific recommendations for policy-based action .
Download Text Version

· Supporting Self-Employment. A menu of state and local initiatives that support microenterprise on the policy level, including actual examples of policies now in place. Prepared by the Center for Policy Alternatives and the Harrison Institute at the Georgetown University Law Center.
Download Text Version
Download MSWord97 Version

· Community Investment Profiles. An information service of the Calvert Social Investment Foundation. These profiles afford a look into some of the microcredit and microenterprise programs profiled in To Our Credit which are supported by investment programs managed by the foundation.
Download Text Version