Abstract

This paper explores the practices and the meanings conveyed through the developing of a European funded financial literacy initiative addressing low income elderly people. This initiative is placed within the global agenda, promoted by national and supranational agencies, identifying financial literacy and financial inclusion as a key strategy to cope with the contemporary challenges emerged by retreat of welfare provision. Based on this empiric case study, the article reflects on how the dominant approach to financial literacy contributes to generate processes of financialization of the everyday life and highlights the tensions, ambivalences and resistance that this approach encounter in its unfolding. In particular, the paper shows the way through which financial literacy programmes affect and question the role of professionals working in the field of education and social work.