Wednesday, December 13th, 2006
Microcredit: Solution to Poverty or False 'Compassionate Capitalism?'

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While everyone praises Muhammad Yunus and his original intent of helping poor women in Bangladesh, some critics say microcredit is being misconstrued as a way of ending poverty. We host a debate with Susan Davis, founder and chair of the Grameen Foundation, and world-renowned environmental leader and thinker, Vandana Shiva. [includes rush transcript]

• Vandana Shiva, world-renowned environmental leader and thinker. She is also a physicist and ecologist and the Director of the Research Foundation on Science, Technology, and Ecology. She is the founder of Navdanya -"nine seeds", a movement promoting diversity and use of native seeds. Dr. Shiva was the 1993 recipient of the Alternative Nobel Peace Prize -the Right Livelihood Award. And she is the author of many books, her latest is "Earth Democracy: Justice, Sustainability, and Peace."
• Susan Davis, she helped to found and is now chairwoman of the Grameen Foundation. She is also chairwoman of the Ashoka Global Academy for Social Entrepreneurship and an adviser to the International Labor Organization. She just returned from Oslo where she attended the Nobel award ceremony for Muhammad Yunus. Last month she was in Halifax for the annual Microcredit Summit in Halifax.