Can large-scale peer interaction foster entrepreneurship and innovation? We conducted an RCT involving almost 5,000 entrepreneurs from 49 African countries. All were enrolled in an online business course, and the treatment involved random assignment to either face-to-face or virtual...

This study examines the effect of a soft commitment device in the form of a savings goal calendar on savings for small business owners in Kampala, Uganda. We run a randomized controlled trial (RCT) under which the treatment group receives a calendar designed to set savings goals and to make a...

Limited borrower information may create targeting distortions in credit markets. Community-based lending programs may reduce these distortions by exploiting information transmitted in local networks, but connections may create asymmetries in power. This paper analyzes how local leaders balance...

We use a novel enterprise survey from Tanzania to gauge the relationship between saving instruments and entrepreneurial reinvestment. While most informal savings practices do not imply a lower likelihood of entrepreneurial reinvestment when compared with formal savings practices, we find a...

Limited borrower information may create targeting distortions in credit markets. Community-based lending programs may reduce these distortions by exploiting information transmitted in local networks, but connections may create asymmetries in power. This paper analyzes how local leaders balance...

Purpose This study examines the comparative link between mobile money and entrepreneurship in East Africa. Apart from analysing our data to examine locational, gender and age heterogeneities in the mobile money-entrepreneurship nexus, we explore the potential roles of digital savings and access...

This paper presents a theory in which risk-averse heterogeneously talented entrepreneurs are the key agents driving the process of development and modernisation. Entrepreneurial skills are private information, which prevents full risk sharing. In that setup, development to a modern industrial...