Economic action in theory and practice : anthropological investigations / edited by Donald C. Wood.

Includes bibliographical references.

This volume contains 14 original chapters focusing on various aspects of economic organization and behaviour, mostly based on empirical fieldwork conducted by the authors themselves. It is a well-balanced collection of chapters on economic issues studied anthropologically, not only in its geographical and theoretical focus but also in showcasing work by established and emerging researchers. Chapters on Africa take a close look at urban food provisioning in Cameroon and an investigation into entrepreneurial activities in the rapidly-changing economy of Cairo. Other chapters examine places and cultures in Central Asia - property rights and state power in Kazakhstan, and animal markets in Kashgar, Western China. The buying and selling activities of ethnic groups within larger societies such as Latin Americans in the USA and Gabor Roma in Romania are highlighted. Concerning North America are chapters on the trans-Atlantic (and global) art market, and on oil drilling in Canada, while in Latin America, income disparities and inequalities in Brazil, development in Colombia, and kin-like compadrazgo networks in Mexico are analyzed. Historical Western Europe and pre-historical Ecuador are also covered.

Introduction / Donald C. Wood -- Borrowed places: eviction wars and property rights formalization in Kazakhstan / Saulesh Yessenova -- Resolving the problem of inequality in the distribution of wealth in Brazil: approaches derived from the Infante Dom Pedro of Portugal, Adam Smith, Karl Marx and Louis Kelso / Sidney M. Greenfield -- Is Joseph Schumpeter's theory of economic development still useful? The case of a semi-rural community in Colombia / Andrés Marroquín Gramajo -- Compadrazgo networks and immigrant adaptation in a Nevada town / Tamar Diana Wilson -- The domestic economy and its implications for social complexity: Spondylus craft production in coastal Ecuador / Alexander J. Martín -- Donkey bazaar, a bazaar of Hell: an investigation into donkeys and donkey trading in Kashgar, Xinjiang, China / Ayxem Eli -- Urban food provisioning in Cameroon: regional banana plantain networks linking Yaounde and the villages of Koumou and Oban / Tite Ngoumou -- Hostile worlds and questionable speculation: recognizing the plurality of views about art and the market / Erica Coslor -- Agents of hybridity: class, culture brokers, and the entrepreneurial imagination in cosmopolitan Cairo / Mark Allen Peterson -- Early markets and the market cross / George Williams -- Shifting transactional identities: bazaar-style trade and risk management in the prestige economy of the Gabor Roma (Romania) / Péter Berta -- Reverse osmosis and a can of beans: an ethnographic study of Latin American immigrant shoppers in Nashville, Tennessee / Peter Redvers-Lee -- Working hard and staying safe: drilling rig hands in Alberta / Dan E. Houser -- Book review: Market and society: The great transformation today, Chris Hann and Keith Hart, Eds. / James R. Stanfield.

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