Introduction
Social credit as a concept has been used since the end of the 20th century with increasing force, in reference to a credit method that meets the needs of a sector of the population in risk of financial exclusion and, therefore, of social exclusion.
Traditional systems for accessing credit require collateral. In the case of secured loans, the first, age-old and historic method of accessing credit, the borrower gives the moneylender an object as a pledge. The object must be of intrinsic value. In Europe, secured loans first developed in the 17th century. Thanks to the humanist-philosophical currents of the Franciscan monks, it was already possible to receive loans by backing them with current —and even future— harvests.
Secured loans, channelled through the pawn banks, rapidly extended worldwide to the point of absorbing a significant amount of resources in our 21st century. Pawn banks increase their business yearly. In Western Europe, for instance, the majority of new pawn bank customers are immigrants, for whom secured loans are extremely useful.
However, if secured loans play a key role in financial integration, changing circumstances in a globalized world require new ways to facilitate disadvantaged people's access to credit.
