Democratizing Finance
Origins of the Community Development Financial Institutions Movement

Decades before Occupy Wall Street challenged the American financial system, activists began organizing alternatives to provide capital to “unbankable” communities and the poor. With roots in the civil rights, anti-poverty, and other progressive movements, they brought little training in finance. They formed nonprofit loan funds, credit unions, and even a new bank—organizations that by 1992 became known as “community development financial institutions,” or CDFIs.
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By melding their vision with that of President Clinton, CDFIs grew from church basements and kitchen tables to number more than 1,000 institutions with billions of dollars of capital. They have helped transform community development by providing credit and financial services across the United States, from inner cities to Native American reservations.

Democratizing Finance traces the roots of community development finance over two centuries, a history that runs from Benjamin Franklin, through an ill-starred bank for African American veterans of the Civil War, the birth of the credit union movement, and the War on Poverty. Drawn from hundreds of interviews with CDFI leaders, presidential archives, and congressional testimony, Democratizing Finance provides an insider view of an extraordinary public policy success. Democratizing Finance is a unique resource for practitioners, policymakers, researchers, and social investors.

Reviews of Democratizing Finance

"Raises provocative, philosophical questions about what we’ve cumulatively learned over the years…  magisterially thorough and thoughtful—and timely given renewed calls to defund the CDFIs. A remarkably incisive history and a wonderfully relevant contribution to an ongoing debate."
– Kirkus Reviews (read the full review)
"This book is a master work on the history of community development finance.... Too few people know of the amazing accomplishments of the affordable housing, community development and community development finance fields. Clifford Rosenthal is changing that."
– From the Foreword by David Erickson Director, Federal Reserve Bank of San Francisco
"Clifford Rosenthal has written a thorough, insightful and, yes, fascinating history and analysis of what we now know as the CDFI field....This book is a huge contribution to the field of community development finance. I highly recommend it to anyone who really wants to understand what the field is all about."
– Michael Swack, Director and Professor, Center for Impact Finance Carsey School of Public Policy, University of New Hampshire

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Democratizing Finance: Origins of the Community Development Financial Institutions Movement is available through the following online retailers and for special order at most local bookstores:
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