1. What is reciprocity? How do various cultures use it?
Unit 2B: Economics
What is reciprocity?
How do various cultures use it?

2. Economics concepts
Every culture has a limited amount of vital resources
Must develop systems of production, distribution, and consumption

3. Economic Anthropology
Economics = focus on production, distribution, and consumption as observed in industrialized world
Economic Anthropology = studies of the three areas comparatively in all societies in the world, industrialized and non-indus.

4. Western Economic View
Western economists assume that individuals and corporations are motivated by desire to maximize material well-being
Other societies’ economic principles may be based on reciprocity or re-distribution practices emphasizing cooperation and generosity
Even in USA there can be increases in instances where people fail to maximize economic well-being

5. Allocation of Natural Resources
Every society has a set of rules governing allocation and use of resources
The degree to which humans are territorial varies widely throughout the world
Idea of personal property is absent in most food collecting, pastoral, and horticultural societies

6. Resources: Food Collectors
Land is not owned
Follow migratory patterns of animals
Claiming/defending territory takes time, energy, and technology that foragers choose not to expend
Territoriality can lead to conflict
Amount of communal control of land varies
Will have flexible boundaries if animals are mobile and supplies unpredictable
Likely to live in permanent settlements and maintain greater land control if supplies are plentiful and predictable

7. Resources: Pastoralists
Require extensive territory and access to water and pasturage for livestock
Must work out arrangements among themselves and with nonpastoralists to gain access to pasturage
Corporate (non-individual) control of pastures is general rule
Allocation of land and resources depends on ecological variables, types of animals, size of population relative to land, relationship of pastoralists to larger society

8. Resources: Horticulturalists
Tend to live on communally controlled land, usually by extended kinship group
Small family units retain rights as long as they work the land and are in good standing with larger family
No advantage to owning land that can’t be used permanently

9. Resources: Intensive Agriculturalists
Resources are allocated using principle of private individual ownership
Western concept of individual property rights has affected research with non-Western peoples
Most westerners believe communal property will be destroyed or degraded because people lack an individual incentive to maintain it

10. Production
Definition: process of obtaining goods from the natural environment and transforming them into usable objects
Vast range of systems of production
Why any society produces certain items is determined by economic factors and cultural values
Most societies fail to exploit all the resources at their disposal

11. Units of Production
All societies have some sort of productive unit comprising people with specific tasks to perform
In most nonindustrialized societies, basic unit of production is the household
Most, if not all, goods and services consumed are produced by members of the household (nuclear or extended)

12. Division of Labor
Every society distinguishes to some degree between appropriate work for men and women (gender) and adults and children (age)

13. Division of Labor: Gender Specialization
Men and women often assigned roles because of social, political, and historical forces operating in individual societies
Theories explaining common, if not universal, division of labor by gender
Men’s greater body mass and strength makes them better equipped for hunting, warfare, land clearing
Women’s tasks compatible with childcare
Mend tend to be more expendable so they engage in dangerous activities

14. Division of Labor: Age Specialization
Elderly, because of waning strength, often prohibited from certain tasks or expected to engage in different activities from earlier years
Because of lack of knowledge and physical strength, children are often excluded from certain tasks
In growing numbers, children under 14 are working full time in the global economy
Negative effects of child labor include working long hours under deplorable conditions for low wages

15. Distribution of Goods and Services
Systems of exchange are essential for every economy
Allow people to dispose of surpluses
Maximize diversity of goods and services consumed
Goods and services are allocated in all societies according to 3 modes of distribution
Reciprocity
Redistribution
Market exchange
Although more than one mode can operate in a society, usually only one predominates

16. Reciprocity
Definition: exchange of goods and services of roughly equal value between two parties without the use of money
3 basic types
Generalized reciprocity
Balanced reciprocity
Negative reciprocity

17. Generalized Reciprocity
An exchange system common among food collectors and contributes to their very survival
Generosity is the highest ideal
Hoarding and stinginess are seen as antisocial
Usually between family members or close friends
Involves highest level of moral obligation
No expectation of immediate return
In USA, seen in giving between parents & kids

18. Balanced Reciprocity
An exchange system involving expectation that goods and services of equivalent value will be returned within a specific period of time
Involves more formal relationships, greater social distance, and strong obligation to repay original gift
Major economic motivation is to exchange surplus good and services for those in short supply
Creates a system of affiliation (Kula Ring)

19. Negative Reciprocity
Form of exchange between equals in which the parties attempt to take advantage of each other
Based on principle of trying to get something for nothing
Involving the most impersonal (possibly hostile) social relations
Sense of altruism and social obligation is at its lowest
Incompatible with close, harmonious relations
Most often practiced against strangers and enemies

20. Redistribution
Goods are given to a central authority and then given back to people in a new pattern
Involves 2 stages: inward flow of goods and services to social center, followed by outward dispersal of goods and services back to society
Most common in societies that have political hierarchies

21. Redistribution: Tribute
Serves social function by dispensing goods within a society and affirming political power of the chief and value of solidarity among the people
Equitable distribution is rarely found in most situations where tribute is given

22. Redistribution: Big Men/Feast Givers
Self-made leaders who are able to convince their relatives/neighbors to contribute surplus goods for the sake of community wide feasting
Economic entrepreneurs
Found widely throughout Melanesia and New Guinea
Work hard to produce surpluses and encourage followers to do the same, all for the sake of giving it away

23. Redistribution: Bridewealth
Involves transfer of valuable commodities from groom’s lineage to the bride’s lineage as a precondition for marriage
Mechanism for maintaining roughly equitable distribution of goods within a society

24. Redistribution: Potlatch
Chiefs or prominent men announce rights, privileges, and high social status within their communities
Claims accompanied by elaborate feasting and gift giving
Host would either give away or destroy all of his personal possessions
Serves as a mechanism for dispersal of material goods
Also serves many socio-political functions

25. Redistribution: Prestige Economies
Institutions of the Kula, potlatch, and Big men/Women are not only mechanisms of distribution, but also ways of allocating prestige and social status through affiliation

26. Redistribution: Market Exchange
Goods and services are bought and sold, often through the use of a standardized currency
Less personal than exchanges based on reciprocity or other forms of redistribution
Exchanges predominantly economic in nature
People more interested in maximizing profits than in maintaining a long-term relationship
Likely found in sedentary societies that produce appreciable surpluses and have complex division of labor