Hidden Hands in the Market: Ethnographies of Fair Trade, Ethical Consumption and Corporate Social ResponsibilityPeter Luetchford, Geert De Neve, Jeffery Pratt In much of the world's economy, production, exchange and consumption are regulated by the Market, which is widely believed to be based on economic rationality and driven by a desire to consume. But there are different views of how the Market operates, or ought to operate. This collection of essays discusses a series of alternative perspectives - manifested in ethical movements, alternative consumer behaviour, and social corporate responsibility initiatives - that seek to reveal the 'hidden hands' of power, inequality and morality that shape Market exchange. Against the impersonality of the Market, we find initiatives, such as local food movements, that seek to re-embed commodity exchange in social relationships. Against the idea of the open economy, we find initiatives that seek to counter the ever-widening gap between producers and consumers. Against increased extraction from less powerful economic actors, we find ethical movements, such as Fair Trade, that work to return a fair share of the price to producers and workers. And, against the unfettered Market, we encounter a move to re-regulate trade and protect those located in the most vulnerable market positions. The volume engages with a range of alternative ethical perspectives and the initiatives to which they give rise. Twelve essays - all based on first-hand ethnographic studies of alternative trade movements, corporate social initiatives and consumer behaviour - provide the groundwork for wide-ranging theoretical engagement and comparative analysis. The case studies cover a range of places, commodities and initiatives, including Fair Trade and organic production activism in Hungary, CSR discourses in South Africa and Europe, Fair Trade coffee in Costa Rica and handicrafts made in Indonesia. The essays contribute to a series of current debates within the social sciences about what drives alternative Market engagements, how they are understood and represented by different actors, and what makes their outcomes often ambivalent or contradictory. They address disjunctions between discourses and practices, and internal inconsistencies within ethical movements and corporate initiatives. The volume as a whole engages with questions about morality and the economy, the creation and circulation of value, and, ultimately, the possibility of making alternatives work. In doing so, the contributors reveal the many fields of power at work within the Market as well as within the movements advocating more ethical economic relationships. The volume will be of particular interest to social scientists, business and management studies scholars, and a range of practitioners. |
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Contents
| 1 | |
The political economy of ethical consumption | 31 |
The local and the authentic | 53 |
crafting and marketing culture in the global handicrafts market | 71 |
Designer copies in a brandname garment factory | 97 |
the geosymbolics of the ethical consumption discourse in Hungary | 123 |
Beyond the charms of the family farm | 143 |
Chapter 8 Making or marketing a differencequest An anthropological examination of the marketing of fair trade cocoa from Ghana | 171 |
Creating fresh markets in a food desert | 195 |
New challenges to trade union and NGO activism in the Tiruppur garment cluster South India | 213 |
Constituting risk and uncertainty | 241 |
the case of Kenyan fairtrade | 271 |
The market morality and corporate responsibility on South Africas platinum belt | 297 |
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Common terms and phrases
activists activities agriculture alternative Anglo Platinum assessment audit authenticity Bali Balinese banks BankTrack Barrientos buyers campaigns Campos de Oro Camtex capitalism Carrier chapter Citigroup clients clothing cocoa coffee commodity chains company’s consumers context Corporate Social Responsibility cultural discourse discussion Dolan Economic Anthropology ecotourism ecotourists employers empowerment Equator Principles ethical consumption ethical trade ethnic art Ethnographies exchange export factory fair trade Fairtrade farm farmers food system garment workers Ghana global Greenpeace handicrafts harvest hectares HSBC HSBC Representative Hungarian initiatives Interview issues Kuapa Kokoo labour LBCs London Luetchford migrant mining moral movements neo-liberalism networks NGOs organic organisations political practices producers relationship Rustenburg Rustenburg Local Municipality sector shop-floor Signature Fashions workers social and environmental social relations standards sustainability Tegallalang thiefing a chance Tiruppur tourism trade unions University Press volume wage Western
Bibliographic information
| Title | Hidden Hands in the Market: Ethnographies of Fair Trade, Ethical Consumption and Corporate Social Responsibility Research in Economic Anthropology |
| Editors | Peter Luetchford, Geert De Neve, Jeffery Pratt |
| Contributor | Donald C. Wood |
| Edition | illustrated |
| Publisher | Emerald Group Publishing, 2008 |
| ISBN | 1848550596, 9781848550599 |
| Length | 272 pages |
| Subjects | › › Business & Economics / Business Ethics Business & Economics / Corporate Governance Business & Economics / International / General |
| Export Citation | BiBTeX EndNote RefMan |