Samenvatting: James Carrier – A Handbook of Economic Anthropology
Chapter 7 – Property (Hann)
Property is closely tied to the history of enclosures and the rise of capitalism.
o This makes it unsuited for analysis of pre-capitalistic or non-European contexts.
Carrier: despite these difficulties, it’s a useful term for economic anthropology.
Private property: goods to which an individual or corporation has exclusive title.
o Private property stands at the core of what is the standard liberal model, which
embraces a capitalistic possessive individualism.
o Property has a wide range of ever changing economic and social functions.
Ex.: Land is no longer a measure of political power or status as it once was.
Ex.: Managerial power has become more important than direct ownership.
Anthropology criticizes property for this narrow definition, and look for a wider compass.
o However, including all rights and entitlements is too wide for good analytical use.
Bundles, hierarchies and layers: theory of property in anthropology
Property relations: social relation between persons with respect to things.
Maine: bundle of rights: different rights can be held by the same thing.
o Ownership: the greatest possible combination of rights over a valuable object which
the law recognises.
o Ex.: Firth: simultaneous individual and joint ownership among the Tobrianders.
Gluckman: estates of administration: the delegation of rights in a political hierarchy.
o It’s not about individual/collective, property reflects the social structure of a group.
Ex.: authorities are obliged to provide citizens with enough land to survive.
During colonial times much of the native land taken as it was ‘wasteland’.
Benda-Beckmann: the abstract social organisation in layers.
1. Cultural-ideological layer: most general layer, cultural norms and ideology.
2. Legal-institutional layer: political and legal regulations.
3. Social-relational layer: land use, inheritance practises, related to kinship.
4. Practical layer: individual influence to reinforce or change the other layers.
o Different layers can interact; as well can technological or political interventions.
o Property is embedded in all layers, but can change at differential rates.
This makes it hard to establish global property regime transformations.
Property is everywhere: communisms, primitive and modern
Various layers can be explored in all societies.
o It was long assumed hunter-gatherer societies were strictly egalitarian.
Today it’s thought that the arid environment creates specific property
relations and that people were able to make some claims to property.
o Even in socialist states there are still property norms with a hierarchy of virtue.
State ownership > collective ownership > individual ownership
Many people maintained some property rights to their land.
Clear legal property rights are not mandatory for high rates of economic growth.
Contemporary issues: commons, cultures and continuous technological change
Economists assume rational agents will construct boundaries around land once the benefits
of excluding others exceed the cost of doing so.
o Anthropology has shown that in some cases collective ownership is advantageous.
Economists assume communal ownership will die out as people pursue individual interests.
o Anthropology has shown that communal ownership can be managed sustainable.
o This is vulnerable in times of demographic pressure and social inequality however.
Ownership says little about sustainability, it depends on the resource and power relations.
Chapter 7 – Property (Hann)
Property is closely tied to the history of enclosures and the rise of capitalism.
o This makes it unsuited for analysis of pre-capitalistic or non-European contexts.
Carrier: despite these difficulties, it’s a useful term for economic anthropology.
Private property: goods to which an individual or corporation has exclusive title.
o Private property stands at the core of what is the standard liberal model, which
embraces a capitalistic possessive individualism.
o Property has a wide range of ever changing economic and social functions.
Ex.: Land is no longer a measure of political power or status as it once was.
Ex.: Managerial power has become more important than direct ownership.
Anthropology criticizes property for this narrow definition, and look for a wider compass.
o However, including all rights and entitlements is too wide for good analytical use.
Bundles, hierarchies and layers: theory of property in anthropology
Property relations: social relation between persons with respect to things.
Maine: bundle of rights: different rights can be held by the same thing.
o Ownership: the greatest possible combination of rights over a valuable object which
the law recognises.
o Ex.: Firth: simultaneous individual and joint ownership among the Tobrianders.
Gluckman: estates of administration: the delegation of rights in a political hierarchy.
o It’s not about individual/collective, property reflects the social structure of a group.
Ex.: authorities are obliged to provide citizens with enough land to survive.
During colonial times much of the native land taken as it was ‘wasteland’.
Benda-Beckmann: the abstract social organisation in layers.
1. Cultural-ideological layer: most general layer, cultural norms and ideology.
2. Legal-institutional layer: political and legal regulations.
3. Social-relational layer: land use, inheritance practises, related to kinship.
4. Practical layer: individual influence to reinforce or change the other layers.
o Different layers can interact; as well can technological or political interventions.
o Property is embedded in all layers, but can change at differential rates.
This makes it hard to establish global property regime transformations.
Property is everywhere: communisms, primitive and modern
Various layers can be explored in all societies.
o It was long assumed hunter-gatherer societies were strictly egalitarian.
Today it’s thought that the arid environment creates specific property
relations and that people were able to make some claims to property.
o Even in socialist states there are still property norms with a hierarchy of virtue.
State ownership > collective ownership > individual ownership
Many people maintained some property rights to their land.
Clear legal property rights are not mandatory for high rates of economic growth.
Contemporary issues: commons, cultures and continuous technological change
Economists assume rational agents will construct boundaries around land once the benefits
of excluding others exceed the cost of doing so.
o Anthropology has shown that in some cases collective ownership is advantageous.
Economists assume communal ownership will die out as people pursue individual interests.
o Anthropology has shown that communal ownership can be managed sustainable.
o This is vulnerable in times of demographic pressure and social inequality however.
Ownership says little about sustainability, it depends on the resource and power relations.
