| This dissertation analyzes microenterprise development programming in the New York City Housing Authority (NYCHA), 1992--1994. The programming, entitled Manage Your Own Business, had an entrpreneurship training component and a microloan fund, Lending Initiatives for Residents . Outcomes from surveys conducted at three different intervals, 1995, 1999 and 2000 show poor results in the efforts.;I provide a case study of the NYCHA experiment as well as historic and political context. I conclude that a strong informal economy is necessary for vibrant micro-entrepreneurship. Additionally, the informal economy is an observed phenomenon in Lesser Developed Nations (LDC's) rather than an imposed one, unlike its attempted implementation in advanced economies. Third, I suggest that the concept of self-reliance, central to microenterprise development as a poverty alleviation tool, was so attractive politically to policy practitioners at NYCHA as to mislead them in programming.;Concentration, in the future, by public agencies should be directed at more appropriate opportunities for very small business development emerging in the current advanced economy of urban United States, as one of many possible avenues for poverty alleviation. |
