Hostname: page-component-586b7cd67f-g8jcs Total loading time: 0 Render date: 2024-11-25T18:57:16.609Z Has data issue: false hasContentIssue false
  • English
  • Français

Mauss's The Gift, or the necessity of an institutional perspective in economics

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  29 October 2019

Mario Aldo Cedrini ,
Angela Ambrosino ,
Roberto Marchionatti  and
Alain Caillé
Mario Aldo Cedrini*
Affiliation:
Dipartimento di Economia e Statistica “Cognetti de Martiis”, Università di Torino
Angela Ambrosino
Affiliation:
Dipartimento di Economia e Statistica “Cognetti de Martiis”, Università di Torino
Roberto Marchionatti
Affiliation:
Dipartimento di Economia e Statistica “Cognetti de Martiis”, Università di Torino
Alain Caillé
Affiliation:
Laboratoire Sophiapol, University of Paris X-Nanterre
*
*Corresponding author. Email: [email protected]
Get access Rights & Permissions [Opens in a new window]

Abstract

The article proposes a reading of Marcel Mauss's insights into gift exchange in primitive societies through the lens of the institutional economics approach. It thus tries to demonstrate that the gift as seen by Mauss can be interpreted as an institution arising from the self-transcendence of social relationships that gifts themselves are expressly designed to create and according to which individuals orient their behavior. On this basis, we provide elements to discuss the benefits that might derive from the adoption of the institutionalist approach in economics.

Keywords

GiftinstitutionsMarcel Maussinstitutional economicseconomic anthropology
Type
Symposium on Institutional Analysis and the Gift
Information
Journal of Institutional Economics , Volume 16 , Issue 5 , October 2020 , pp. 687 - 701
Copyright
Copyright © Millennium Economics Ltd 2019

Access options

Get access to the full version of this content by using one of the access options below. (Log in options will check for institutional or personal access. Content may require purchase if you do not have access.)

References

Adloff, F. (2016), Gifts of Cooperation, Mauss and Pragmatism, London: Routledge.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Adloff, F. and Mau, S. (2006), ‘Giving Social Ties: Reciprocity in Modern Society’, Archives Européennes de Sociologie, 47(1): 93–123.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Ambrosino, A. (2012), ‘Cognizione ed evoluzione istituzionale: un rilevante punto di contatto fra Hayek e la teoria del cambiamento istituzionale di Veblen’, Studi e Note in Economia, 17(2): 219–247.Google Scholar
Ambrosino, A. (2016), ‘Heterogeneity and Law: Toward a Cognitive Legal Theory’, Journal of Institutional Economics, 12(2): 417–442.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Anspach, M. R. (2002), A charge de revanche. Figures élémentaires de la réciprocité, Paris: Seuil.Google Scholar
Anspach, M. R. (2017), Vengeance in Reverse: The Tangled Loops of Violence, Myth, and Madness, East Lansing, MI: Michigan University Press.Google Scholar
Aria, M. (2008), ‘Dono hau e reciprocità. Alcune riletture antropologiche di Marcel Mauss’, in Aria, M. and Dei, F. (eds), Culture del dono, Roma: Meltemi, 181–219.Google Scholar
Ashraf, N., Camerer, C. F. and Loewenstein, G. (2005) ‘Adam Smith, Behavioral Economist’, Journal of Economic Perspectives, 19(3): 131–145.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Ayers, C. E. (1944), The Theory of Economic Progress, Chapel Hill, NC: University of North Carolina Press.Google Scholar
Berking, H. (1999), Sociology of Giving, London: Sage.Google Scholar
Boas, F. (1897), The Social Organization and the Secret Societies of the Kwakiutl Indians, Report of National Museum of National History for 1885, Washington, DC.Google Scholar
Caillé, A. (1998), Il terzo paradigma. Antropologia filosofica del dono, Torino: Bollati Boringhieri.Google Scholar
Caillé, A. (2000), ‘Gift and Association’, in Vandevelde, A. (ed.), Gifts and Interests, Leuven: Peeters, pp. 47–55.Google Scholar
Cedrini, M. and Fontana, M. (2018), ‘Just Another Niche in the Wall? How Specialization Is Changing the Face of Mainstream Economics’, Cambridge Journal of Economics, 42(2): 427–451.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Clastres, P. (1974), Society against the State: Essays in Political Anthropology, Cambridge (MA): MIT Press.Google Scholar
Clastres, P. (1994[1980]), Archeology of Violence, New York: Semiotext(e).Google Scholar
Commons, J. R. (1934), Institutional Economics, New York: Macmillan.Google Scholar
Davis, J. B. (2008), “Heterodox Economics, the Fragmentation of the Mainstream, and Embedded Individual Analysis”, in Harvey, J. T. and Garnett, R. F. (eds), Future Directions for Heterodox Economics, Ann Arbor: University of Michigan Press, pp. 53–72.Google Scholar
Dennett, D. C. (1995), Darwin's Dangerous Idea: Evolution and the Meanings of Life, London: Allen Lane.Google Scholar
Douglas, M. (1990), ‘Foreword’, in Mauss, M., The Gift: The Form and Reason for Exchange in Archaic Societies, New York: W. W. Norton, vii–xviii.Google Scholar
Durkheim, E. (1893), The Division of Labour, Illinois: Free Press of Glencoe.Google Scholar
Finley, M. I. (1956), The World of Odysseus, London: Chatto & Windus.Google Scholar
Fiori, S. (2000), Ordine, mano invisibile, mercato. Una rilettura di Adam Smith, Milano: UTET.Google Scholar
Fourcade, M. and Healy, K. (2007), ‘Moral Views of Market Society’, Annual Review of Sociology, 33(1): 285–311.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Gasché, R. (1972), ‘Heliocentric Exchange’, L'Arc, 48: 70–84.Google Scholar
Girard, R. (1977), Violence and the Sacred, Baltimore: Johns Hopkins University Press.Google Scholar
Godbout, J. T. (2004), ‘L'actualité de l’«Essai sur le don»’, Sociologie et sociétés, 36(2): 177–188.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Godbout, J. T. (2007), Ce qui circule entre nous. Donner, recevoir, rendre, Paris: Seuil.Google Scholar
Godbout, J. T. (in collaboration with Caillé, A.) (1998), The World of the Gift, Montreal and Ithaca, NY: McGill-Queen's University Press.Google Scholar
Griswold, C. L. (2006), ‘Imagination: Morals, Science, and Arts’, in Haakonssen, K. (ed.), The Cambridge Companion to Adam Smith, Cambridge, MA: Cambridge University Press, pp. 22–56.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Hamilton, W. H. (1932), ‘Institution’, in Seligman, E. R. A. (ed.), Encyclopaedia of the Social Sciences, vol. 8, London: Macmillan, 84–89.Google Scholar
Hart, K. (2007), ‘Marcel Mauss: In Pursuit of the Whole. A Review Essay’, Comparative Study in Society and History, 49(2): 1–13.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Henrich, J., Boyd, R., Bowles, S., Camerer, C., Fehr, E., Gintis, H. and McElreath, R. (2001), ‘In Search of Homo Economicus: Behavioral Experiments in 15 Small-scale Societies’, American Economic Review, 91(2): 73–78.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Hirschman, A. O. (1977), The Passions and the Interests: Political Arguments for Capitalism before Its Triumph, Princeton: Princeton University Press.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Hodgson, G. M. (2000), ‘What is the Essence of Institutional Economics?’, Journal of Economic Issues, 34(2): 317–329.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Hodgson, G. M. (2003), ‘The Hidden Persuaders: Institutions and Individuals in Economic Theory’, Cambridge Journal of Economics, 27(2): 159–175.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Hodgson, G. M. (2004), The Evolution of Institutional Economics: Agency, Structure and Darwinism in American Institutionalism, London and New York: Routledge.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Hodgson, G. M. (2006), ‘What are Institutions?’, Journal of Economic Issues, 40(1): 1–25.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Hodgson, G. M. (2013), From Pleasure Machines to Moral Communities: An Evolutionary Economics without Homo Economicus, Chicago, University of Chicago Press.Google Scholar
Hodgson, G. M. (2019), ‘Taxonomic Definitions in Social Science, with Firms, Markets and Institutions as Case Studies’, Journal of Institutional Economics, 15(2): 207–233.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Hodgson, G. M. and Stoelhorst, J. (2014), ‘Introduction to the Special Issue on the Future of Institutional and Evolutionary Economics’, Journal of Institutional Economics, 10(4): 513–540.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Hyde, L. (1983), The Gift: Imagination and the Erotic Life of Property, New York: Vintage.Google Scholar
Lévi-Strauss, C. (1969[1950]), Introduction to the Works of Marcel Mauss, London: Routledge & Kegan Paul.Google Scholar
Lyotard, J. F. (1979), La condition postmoderne. Rapport sur le Savoir, Paris: Éditions de Minuit.Google Scholar
Malinowski, B. (1921), ‘The Primitive Economics of the Trobriand Islanders’, Economic Journal, 31(121): 1–16.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Marchionatti, R. and Cedrini, M. (2017), Economics as Social Science: Economics Imperialism and the Challenge of Interdisciplinarity, London and New York: Routledge.Google Scholar
Marouby, C. (2007), ‘Adam Smith and the Anthropology of the Enlightenment: The “Ethnographic” Sources of Economic Progress’, in Wolff, L. and Cipolloni, M. (eds), The Anthropology of the Enlightenment, Palo Alto: Stanford University Press, pp. 85–102.Google Scholar
Mauss, M. (1990[1923–1924]), The Gift. The Form and Reason for Exchange in Archaic Societies, London and New York: Routledge.Google Scholar
Mehta, P. B. (2006), ‘Self-interest and Other Interests’, in Haakonssen, K. (ed.), The Cambridge Companion to Adam Smith, Cambridge, MA: Cambridge University Press, 246–269.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Metcalf, S. (2017), ‘Neoliberalism: the Idea that Changed the World’, The Guardian, August 18, https://www.theguardian.com/news/2017/aug/18/neoliberalism-the-idea-that-changed-the-world (accessed: February 1, 2019).Google Scholar
Mirowski, P. (2001), ‘Refusing the Gift’, in Cullenberg, S., Amariglio, J. and Ruccio, D. F. (eds), Postmodernism, Economics and Knowledge, London and New York: Routledge, pp. 431–458.Google Scholar
Montesquieu, (2001[1748]), The Spirits of Laws, Kitchener: Batoche Books.Google Scholar
Negru, I. (2010), ‘The Plural Economy of Gift and Markets’, in Garnett, R. F. Jr, Olsen, E., Starr, M. (eds), Economic Pluralism, London: Routledge, 194–204.Google Scholar
Osteen, M. (2010), ‘Jazzing the Gift: Improvisation, Reciprocity, Excess’, Rethinking Marxism, 22(4): 569–580.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Paganelli, M. P. (2008), ‘The Adam Smith Problem in Reverse: Self-Interest in The Wealth of Nations and The Theory of Moral Sentiments’, History of Political Economy, 40(2): 365–382.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Paganelli, M. P. (2010), ‘The Moralizing Role of Distance in Adam Smith: The Theory of Moral Sentiments as Possible Praise of Commerce’, History of Political Economy, 42(3): 425–441.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Parry, J. (1986), ‘The Gift, the Indian Gift and the “Indian Gift”’, Man, 21(3): 453–473.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Polanyi, K. (1977), The Livelihood of Man, edited by Pearson, H. W., New York: Academic Press.Google Scholar
Posner, R. (1980), ‘A Theory of Primitive Society, with Special Reference to Law’, Journal of Law and Economics, 23(1): 1–53.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Sahlins, M. (1972), Stone Age Economics, Chicago: Aldine.Google Scholar
Searle, J. (2005), ‘What is an Institution?’, Journal of Institutional Economics, 1(1): 1–22.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Sen, A. (2013), ‘Foreword’, in Hirschman, A., The Passions and the Interests: Political Arguments for Capitalism before Its Triumph, Princeton: Princeton University Press, pp. ix–xix.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Simmel, G. (1958[1908]), Soziologie. Untersuchungen über die Formen der Vergesellschaftung, Berlin: Duncker & Humblot.Google Scholar
Smith, A. (1975a[1763]), Early draft of Lectures on Jurisprudence, in Meek, R. L., Raphael, D. D. and Stein, P. G. (eds), Glasgow edition of The Works and Correspondence of Adam Smith, Vol. V, Oxford: Clarendon Press.Google Scholar
Smith, A. (1975b[1759]), ‘The Theory of Moral Sentiments’, in Meek, R. L., Raphael, D. D. and Stein, P. G. (eds), Glasgow edition of The Works and Correspondence of Adam Smith, Vol. I, Oxford: Clarendon Press.Google Scholar
Smith, A. (1976[1776]) An Inquiry into the Nature and Causes of the Wealth of Nations, Campbell, R. H. and Skinner, A. S. (eds), Glasgow edition of The Works and Correspondence of Adam Smith, Vol. II, Oxford: Clarendon Press.Google Scholar
Smith, V. (1998), ‘The Two Faces of Adam Smith’, Southern Economic Journal, 65(1): 1–19.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Smith, V. (2013), ‘Adam Smith: From Propriety and Sentiments to Property and Wealth’, Forum for Social Economics, 42(4): 283–297.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Stewart, D. (1982[1793]), Account of the Life and Writings of Adam Smith, in Wightman, W. P. D. (ed.), Glasgow edition of The Works and Correspondence of Adam Smith, Vol. III, Oxford: Clarendon Press.Google Scholar
Stoelhorst, J. W. (2014), ‘The Future of Evolutionary Economics Is in a Vision from the Past’, Journal of Institutional Economics, 10(4): 665–682.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Tarot, C. (1999), De Durkheim à Mauss, l'invention du symbolique: Sociologie et sciences des religions, Paris: La Découverte/MAUSS.Google Scholar
Titmuss, R. M. T. (1968), Commitment to Welfare, London: George Allen & Unwin.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Tomasello, M. (2009), Why We Cooperate, Cambridge: MIT Press.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Tomasello, M. (2016), A Natural History of Human Morality, Cambridge: Harvard University Press.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Vattimo, G. (1991), The End of Modernity: Nihilism and Hermeneutics in Postmodern Culture, Baltimore: Johns Hopkins University Press.Google Scholar
Veblen, T. (1898), ‘Why Is Economics Not an Evolutionary Science?’, Quarterly Journal of Economics, 12(4): 373–397.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Weissman, D. (2000), A Social Ontology, New Haven, CT: Yale University Press.Google Scholar
Winter, S. (2014), ‘The Future of Evolutionary Economics: Can We Break Out of the Beachhead?’, Journal of Institutional Economics, 10(4): 613–644.CrossRefGoogle Scholar