Process View of Peer Monitoring In Group Lending

Abstract

This study aims at providing a Process view model of Peer monitoring for the Self-help groups in India. As a phenomenon Peer Monitoring provides a window of opportunity to leverage Peer mechanism to create information asymmetry and set the trajectory for the sustainable growth of the Self-help group linkage programme.  For the purpose of analysis, the Systematic Literature review approach has been used.  A total of 42 articles have been shortlisted from the pool of 949 articles. The data was collected using organisational evidence, experimental evidence and stakeholder perspective. As per the principle of triangulation data has been selected from the multiple sources. This study provides a summary of literature in domain of peer monitoring and also provides a Process view of evolution in this field. The study concludes that there is a huge gap in the field of Microfinance. Group lending has emerged as a panacea to resolve issues of lack of collateral through Peer Monitoring, which has evolved as a three-step process of peer selection, peer monitoring and peer sanction. The group became more heterogeneous as per the risk propensity.  Due to lack of literature in this domain, the theoretical comparison was not possible. This study is of practical relevance to the Policy makers and bankers to tackle issues in microlending in context of Group lending in rural India and will be the first ever study done to create a process view of Peer Monitoring in context of Self-help groups in India.