Conference: Building Economically Self-Reliant Families

The Economic Self-Reliance Conference is the yearly conference for organizations and individuals participating with the Brigham Young University Center for Economic Self-Reliance.

For the past seven years the faculty and students of the Marriott School of Business at Brigham Young University have sponsored a conference focusing on the microenterprise movement. The conference has also been a gathering place for likeminded organizations and individuals who were interested in other development activities that benefited families. In addition, the conference has sponsored breakout sessions dealing with NGO and nonprofit effectiveness.

With the creation of the BYU Center for Economic Self-Reliance in 2003 additional resources have been created to continue supporting and enhancing microenterprise efforts while also researching and working with other interventions that benefit families economically.

The conference will happen in March of 2005.

The conference organizers are looking for papers from practitioners, academics, and students on all aspects of building economically self-reliant families. However, papers which deal specifically with impact assessment on individual families: what is working and what is not, would be especially appreciated.

Link here for conference details.

Conference attendees are:

• Practitioners (NGOs, nonprofit organizations, churches, government entities, etc.)


• Researchers (faculty, students, researchers from non-academic institutions, etc.)


• Friends of the Self-Reliance Center (donors, advisors, mentors, interested community members, etc.)

who are involved in helping families become economically self-reliant throughout the world.