Abstract: The chapter starts with an overview of global environmental problems and asks whether green finance can address them. In order to do so, the chapter provides a brief history of green finance and presents a framework for understanding different approaches to green finance. Based on the expected mechanisms and underlying theories, the scope and the goals of green financial strategies and green central bank policies, we distinguish between neoliberal, reformist, and transformative-progressive forms of green finance. Whilst neoliberal forms of green finance assume commensurability and the idea that market-based mechanisms will solve environmental problems, reformist perspectives are sceptical and demand strict regulations and government policies. In so doing, reformist measures are likely to contribute to green growth. Transformative-progressive perspectives on green finance go beyond reformist approaches and support a socio-ecological transformation of the mode of production that aims at allowing equal access for all to the use of nature without destroying the ecological foundations of the planet. Based on this framework the chapter introduces the contributions in the book.