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SIPA Faculty
Jeffrey A. Ashe
International Affairs Building, 13th Floor
Adjunct Associate Professor of International and Public Affairs
Phone: 212-854-3213
ja2144@columbia.edu
Biography:
Jeffrey Ashe is the Manager of Community Finance at Oxfam America where he and his team has launched the Saving for Change Initiative with plans to organize 1,000,000 poor women into self-help groups. He also teaches microfinance at Brandeis and Columbia Universities.
Prior to coming to Oxfam, Mr. Ashe founded Working Capital and served as its Executive Director for eight years. Working Capital was the largest microenterprise program in the United States, and franchised its model in eight states and Russia.
Before starting Working Capital, Mr. Ashe was Director of the "PISCES Project," the first worldwide investigation of programs reaching the smallest economic activities of the poor. PISCES laid the groundwork for the best practice work that has followed over the past two decades. As Senior Associate Director at ACCION International, he assisted in the dissemination of peer group lending throughout Latin America.
After he left ACCION, Mr. Ashe designed, assisted and evaluated microenterprise programs in thirty five countries in Asia, Africa, Latin America and Eastern Europe for the World Bank, the Agency for International Development, CIDA, ODA, and many NGO clients.
Mr. Ashe has published extensively in the micro-enterprise field and is the author of several books and articles on the topic. He holds a BA in Political Science from the University of California, Berkley, and an MA in Sociology from Boston University.