Book•
The social structures of the economy
01 Jan 2005-
TL;DR: In this article, the Foundations of Petit Bourgeois Suffering and the Foundational Principles of an Economic Anthropology are discussed, as well as a contract under duress and the construction of the market.
Abstract: Introduction. Part I The House Market. Chapter 1 Dispositions of the Agents and the Structure of the Field of Reproduction. Chapter 2 --The State and the Construction of the Market. Chapter 3 -- The Field of Local Powers. Chapter 4 -- A Contract under Duress. Conclusion -- The Foundations of Petit Bourgeois Suffering. Part II Principles of an Economic Anthropology. Postscript -- From the National to the International Field. Notes. Index.
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TL;DR: In this article, the authors propose a theoretical framework that helps to deal with markets without suspending their calculative properties, and apply this definition to three constitutive elements of markets: economic goods, economic agents and economic exchanges.
Abstract: How to address empirically the calculative character of markets without dissolving it? In our paper, we propose a theoretical framework that helps to deal with markets without suspending their calculative properties. In the first section, we construct a broad definition of calculation, grounded on the anthropology of science and techniques. In the next sections, we apply this definition to three constitutive elements of markets: economic goods, economic agents and economic exchanges. First, we examine the question of the calculability of goods: in order to be calculated, goods must be calculable. In the following section, we introduce the notion of calculative distributed agencies to understand how these calculable goods are actually calculated. Thirdly, we consider the rules and material devices that organize the encounter between (and aggregation of) individual supplies and demands, i.e. the specific organizations that allow for a calculated exchange and a market output. Those three elements define conc...
1,152 citations
Cites background from "The social structures of the econom..."
...…to one of heteronomy is studied by Pierre Bourdieu in his analysis of the real estate market: the encounter between the seller and the potential buyer becomes a tug of war in which the former tries to impose his or her own calculative tools on the latter — often with success (Bourdieu 2005)....
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...It is singular and comparable, and consequently calculable, but in a way that is immediate (Lépinay 2003)....
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TL;DR: The authors examines in microcosm such institutional voids and illustrates the activities of an entrepreneurial actor in rural Bangladesh aimed at addressing them, and depicts the crafting of new institutional arrangements as an ongoing process of bricolage and unveil its political nature as well as its potentially negative consequences.
1,033 citations
TL;DR: In this paper, the authors uncover institutional voids as the source of market exclusion and identify two sets of activities: redefining market architecture and legitimating new actors as critical for building "inclusive" markets.
Abstract: Much effort goes into building markets as a tool for economic and social development, often overlooking that in too many places social exclusion and poverty prevent many, especially women, from participating in and accessing markets. Building on data from rural Bangladesh and analyzing the work of a prominent intermediary organization, we uncover institutional voids as the source of market exclusion and identify two sets of activities – redefining market architecture and legitimating new actors – as critical for building ‘inclusive’ markets. We expose voids as ‘analytical spaces’ and illustrate how they result from conflict and contradiction among institutional ‘bits and pieces’ from local political, community, and religious spheres. Our findings put forward a perspective on market building that highlights the ‘on the ground’ dynamics and attends to the ‘institutions at play’, to their consequences, and to a more diverse set of ‘inhabitants’ of institutions.
719 citations
TL;DR: In this article, a more informed and comprehensive account of what a relational and Bourdieu-inspired agenda for organizational research might look like is presented, with the primary advantage of such an approach being the central place accorded therein to the social conditions under which inter- and intraorganizational power relations are produced, reproduced, and contested.
Abstract: Despite some promising steps in the right direction, organizational analysis has yet to exploit fully the theoretical and empirical possibilities inherent in the writings of Pierre Bourdieu. While certain concepts associated with his thought, such as field and capital, are already widely known in the organizational literature, the specific ways in which these terms are being used provide ample evidence that the full significance of his relational mode of thought has yet to be sufficiently apprehended. Moreover, the almost complete inattention to habitus, the third of Bourdieu’s major concepts, without which the concepts of field and capital (at least as he deployed them) make no sense, further attests to the misappropriation of his ideas and to the lack of appreciation of their potential usefulness. It is our aim in this paper, by contrast, to set forth a more informed and comprehensive account of what a relational – and, in particular, a Bourdieu-inspired – agenda for organizational research might look like. Accordingly, we examine the implications of his theoretical framework for interorganizational relations, as well as for organizations themselves analyzed as fields. The primary advantage of such an approach, we argue, is the central place accorded therein to the social conditions under which inter- and intraorganizational power relations are produced, reproduced, and contested.
663 citations
Posted Content•
TL;DR: In this paper, the authors propose a theoretical framework that helps to deal with markets without suspending their calculative properties, and apply this definition to three constitutive elements of markets: economic goods, economic agents and economic exchanges.
Abstract: How to address empirically the calculative character of markets without dissolving it? In our paper, we propose a theoretical framework that helps to deal with markets without suspending their calculative properties. In the first section, we construct a broad definition of calculation, grounded on the anthropology of science and techniques. In the next sections, we apply this definition to three constitutive elements of markets: economic goods, economic agents and economic exchanges. First, we examine the question of the calculability of goods: in order to be calculated, goods must be calculable. In the following section, we introduce the notion of calculative distributed agencies to understand how these calculable goods are actually calculated. Thirdly, we consider the rules and material devices that organize the encounter between (and aggregation of) individual supplies and demands, i.e. the specific organizations that allow for a calculated exchange and a market output. Those three elements define concrete markets as collective organized devices that calculate compromises on the values of goods. In each, we encounter different versions of our broad definition of calculation, which we illustrate with examples, mainly taken from the fields of financial markets and mass retail.
629 citations
Cites background from "The social structures of the econom..."
...…of heteronomy is studied by Pierre Bourdieu in his analysis of the real estate market: the encounter between the seller and the potential buyer becomes a tug-ofwar in which the former tries to impose his or her own calculative tools on the latter – often with success (Bourdieu, 2004: chapter 4)....
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