Markets and Moralities Ethnographies of Postsocialism

by Mandel, Ruth; Humphrey, Caroline

• ISBN13: 9781859735725
• ISBN10: 185973572X
• eBook ISBN(s): 9781000189285
• Format: Hardcover
• Copyright: 2002-06-01
• Publisher: Berg Pub Ltd

Summary

Before the collapse of the Eastern Bloc, private marketeering was regarded not only as criminal, but even immoral by socialist regimes. Ten years after taking on board western market-orientated shock therapy, post-socialist societies are still struggling to come to terms with the clash between these deeply engrained moralities and the daily pressures to sell and consume. This book explores the new market and its resulting contradictions in a rapidly developing Eastern Europe and Russia. Will Western fast-food industries irrevocably alter local culinary practices? What effect has the privatization of land had upon ownership and exchange? What role do new commodities play within the household? Based on original, first-hand ethnography, this book is a long-awaited addition to existing literature on post-socialist societies. It will be essential reading for students of anthropology, sociology, European and cultural studies, as well as professional groups working in Eastern Europe and Russia, including NGOs, development organizations and businesses.

Author Biography

Ruth Mandel is a Lecturer in Anthropology, at the University College London.

Caroline Humphrey is a Professor of Asian Anthropology, at the University of Cambridge

Table of Contents

A Note on the Cover: Weiche	vii
Neo Rauch
Acknowledgements	ix
Notes on Contributors	xi
The Market in Everyday Life: Ethnographies of Postsocialism	1	(18)
Caroline Humphrey
Ruth Mandel
Part I Trading Cultures, Market Ambiguity, and Historical Transformation
Women and the Culture of Entrepreneurship in Soviet and Post-Soviet Azerbaijan	19	(14)
Farideh Heyat
The Shame and Pride of Market Activity: Morality, Identity and Trading in Postsocialist Rural Bulgaria	33	(20)
Deema Kaneff
Heritage and Enterprise Culture in Archangel, Northern Russia	53	(22)
Julian Watts
Dealing with Money: Zlotys, Dollars and Other Currencies in the Polish Highlands	75	(26)
Frances Pine
Part II Consumption and Modernities
Chasing Moths: Cleanliness, Intimacy and Progress in Romania	101	(26)
Adam Drazin
Re-constructing the `Normal': Identity and the Consumption of Western Goods in Estonia	127	(16)
Sigrid Rausing
Manufacturing the New Consumerism: Fast-Food Restaurants in Postsocialist Hungary	143	(26)
Andre P. Czegledy
Part III Rural and Institutional Transformations
Coping with the Market in Rural Ukraine	169	(22)
Louise Perrotta
Mongolia in the `Age of the Market': Pastoral Land-use and the Development Discourse	191	(20)
David Sneath
Broadening the Concept of Privatization: Gender and Development in Rural Kazakhstan	211	(26)
Rosamund Shreeves
Index	237