The curse of the modern: A Post Keynesian critique of the gift|exchange dichotomy

Abstract

The anthropological literature on the gift has split the social and material world into a premodern realm of thick sociality where gifting is located, and a modern realm of thin sociality in which exchange occurs. It concedes the modern realm to neoclassical economists. This paper challenges both the premodern/modern split and the adequacy of neoclassical theory as a description of material life anywhere, drawing on Post Keynesian critiques of the neoclassical treatment of time. The heterodox Post Keynesian school provides a conception of the subject situated in time that is better fitted to non-reductionist theories of material life.

Citation

Danby, C. (2002), "The curse of the modern: A Post Keynesian critique of the gift|exchange dichotomy", Research in Economic Anthropology (Research in Economic Anthropology, Vol. 21), Emerald Group Publishing Limited, Leeds, pp. 13-42. https://doi.org/10.1016/S0190-1281(02)21002-1