This text is concerned with the increasingly important and problematic area of financial exclusion, broadly defined as the inability and/or reluctance of particular societal groups to access mainstream financial services. This has emerged as a major international policy issue. There is growing evidence that deregulation in developed financial sectors improves financial inclusion for some societal groups (more products become available to a bigger customer base), but may at the same time exacerbate it for others (for example, by emphasizing greater customer segmentation and more emphasis on risk-based pricing and ‘value added’). In developing countries access to financial services is typically limited and therefore providing wider access to such services can aid financial and economic development. This is the first text to analyze financial exclusion issues in different parts of the world and it covers the various public and private sector mechanisms that have been advanced to help eradicate this problem.

Author Biography

SANTIAGO CARBO is Professor of Economics at the University of Granada, Spain. He is also the Head of Research on Financial Systems at the Savings Banks Foundations (Funcas) in Spain. He has published over 80 articles, monographs and book chapters on banking and the role of the financial system in the economy and society. EDWARD GARDNER is Professor of Banking and Finance, Director of the School for Business and Regional Development and Co-Director of the Institute of European Finance at the University of Wales, Bangor. He is also the Bank of Valleta Chair in International Banking and Finance at the University of Malta. PHILIP MOLYNEUX is Professor in Banking and Finance at the University of Wales, Bangor and at Erasmus University, Rotterdam, Netherlands. He has published widely in the banking and finance area. His recent books include Private Banking, Financial Innovation, European Banking: Efficiency, Growth and Technology, Banking and Financial Systems in the Arab World (with Munawar Iqbal) and Thirty Years of Islamic Banking (with Munawar Iqbal).

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