Microfinance is a capitalist paradox. In a region of great inequality and economic instability, it has been able to create viable services for those at the base of the economic and social pyramid, survive and grow in adverse economic conditions, and become a profitable and rapidly growing part of the regulated financial sector. This book offers an inside view of Latin American microfinance, as seen by those who have worked over the decades to make it grow. The lessons are relevant not only for the global microfinance community, but for the field of development writ large.