Participatory ambiguity and the emergence of the global financial inclusion agenda

Abstract

In the context of post-crisis global economic governance, the global financial inclusion agenda is widely supported by international organizations, states, and civil society organizations. Some scholars attribute the rise of this agenda to the logic of neoliberalism and power of global financial actors, yet these accounts often obscure the role of ambiguity in facilitating broad support. In scholarship on coalition politics, ambiguity is often attributed to the strategic behaviour and framing techniques of central actors (e.g. entrepreneurs). In this article, I develop the novel framework of participatory ambiguity to explain the origins of the financial inclusion agenda and theorize the co-production of ambiguity among members of the supporting coalition. By tracing the development of the agenda, I identify the origins of its ambiguity in the efforts of disparate actors to shape the purposes and direction of the agenda in favourable ways across development, economic, and security domains. This article thus offers a more complete explanation of the origins of financial inclusion at the global level. It also provides an original theoretical perspective on the construction of ideas, agency, ambiguity, and global coalitions that can be used to better explain the development of other global policy agendas.