Sociology Of Markets Research Papers (original) (raw)

Economic sociology is the study of how the material conditions of life are produced and reproduced through social processes. The field of economic sociology can be separated into the sociology of markets and the sociology of consumption.... more

Economic sociology is the study of how the material conditions of life are produced and reproduced through social processes. The field of economic sociology can be separated into the sociology of markets and the sociology of consumption. The sociology of markets views markets as socially constructed arenas where repeated exchanges occur between buyers and sellers under a set of formal and informal rules governing relations between competitors, suppliers, and customers. Markets are dependent on governments, laws, and cultural understandings that support market activity. There are four bodies of work that provide different views on the mechanisms by which markets are organized: networks, institutions, political economy, and the study of market devices and the performativity of economic ideas. The sociology of consumption situates consumption in the problem of what consuming things means to people. One core idea is that consumption is about how people constitute their lifestyles. Lifestyles can be constructed in emulation of other groups or instead by competition between social groups for status. Another aspect of consumption is how morals and meanings affect what goods can be bought and sold. Scholars have explored why some products can and cannot be commoditized and how that has evolved over time.

Consommer et protéger l’environnement. Voilà deux motivations qui apparaissent à bien des égards antagonistes. La montée de préoccupations écologiques et leur écho dans les médias commencent pourtant à avoir des répercussions sur les... more

Consommer et protéger l’environnement. Voilà deux motivations qui apparaissent à bien des égards antagonistes. La montée de préoccupations écologiques et leur écho dans les médias commencent pourtant à avoir des répercussions sur les tendances de consommation. Une première évolution porte sur l’apparition d’une consommation contribuant à la diminution des dépenses énergétiques. Celle-ci s’accompagne d’une responsabilisation des adultes et d’une reconfiguration des relations parents-enfants. Les logiques marchandes sont également mises à contribution pour inciter les consommateurs à privilégier des produits mieux-disants sur l’indice équivalent carbone. Une seconde tendance questionne la consommation de manière plus radicale. Elle concerne les rapports entre consommateurs et producteurs, s’étend à la remise en cause de l’idée même de consommation et de croissance et passe par l’expression des craintes légitimes des consommateurs concernant l’introduction de poissons génétiquement modifiés. C’est à l’analyse de la mise en oeuvre de ces formes de consommation durable et responsable que cet ouvrage, issu de la rencontre de chercheurs des réseaux thématiques « sociologie de la consommation » et « sociologie de l’environnement » de l’Association Française de Sociologie, est consacré.

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The emerging field of token engineering aims to open “economy itself as design space,” using blockchains and other distributed ledger and smart contract tech- nologies in combination with game theory and behavioral economics. This paper... more

The emerging field of token engineering aims to open “economy itself as design space,” using blockchains and other distributed ledger and smart contract tech- nologies in combination with game theory and behavioral economics. This paper describes the emergence of the Ethereum network as the principle site for the development of a cryptographically tokenized mode of economic life, and the re- construction of human economic agency along game-theoretic lines in the figure of Homo cryptoeconomicus. The paper draws together questions from the econo- mization and marketization, materiality and human/non-human agency programs in economic sociology: token engineering represents both a new field of practice for a self-consciously performative economics, and a potential point of intervention for a practice-oriented mode of social studies of finance.

Markets are key contemporary institutions, yet there is little agreement concerning their history or diversity. To complicate matters, markets have been considered by different academic disciplines that approach the nature of such... more

Markets are key contemporary institutions, yet there is little agreement concerning their history or diversity. To complicate matters, markets have been considered by different academic disciplines that approach the nature of such exchange systems from diametrically opposed perspectives that impede cross-disciplinary dialogue. This paper reviews the theoretical and methodological issues surrounding the detection, development, and significance of markets in the preindustrial past. We challenge both the view that marketing is natural and the perspective that market exchange is unique to modern capitalist contexts. Both of these frameworks fail to recognize that past and present market activities are embedded in their larger societal contexts, albeit in different ways that can be understood only if examined through a broadly shared theoretical lens.We examine the origins, change, and diversity of preindustrial markets, calling for multiscalar, cross-disciplinary approaches to investigate the long-term history of this economic institution.

The paper reports on both methodological and substantive findings. It presents a method for generating simplified representations for regional urban populations, their geographical sub-populations and communities. the method generates... more

The paper reports on both methodological and substantive findings. It presents a method for generating simplified representations for regional urban populations, their geographical sub-populations and communities. the method generates greatly simplified high-resolution socio-economic profiles of populated geographical areas from complex large census data sets.

Markets are socially constructed arenas where repeated exchanges occur between buyers and sellers under a set of formal and informal rules governing relations among competitors, suppliers, and customers. These arenas operate according to... more

Markets are socially constructed arenas where repeated exchanges occur between buyers and sellers under a set of formal and informal rules governing relations among competitors, suppliers, and customers. These arenas operate according to local understandings and rules that guide interaction, facilitate trade, define what products are produced, indeed constitute the products themselves, and provide stability for buyers, sellers, and producers. Marketplaces are also dependent on governments, laws, and cultural understandings supporting market activity. Our essay provides a brief exposition of this perspective. Then, it considers cutting-edge work on three topics: (i) the formation of markets and prices, (ii) the organization of capitalism in different societies, and (iii) financialization and globalization. We suggest that in the future, path breaking research will: (i) explore the sociology of consumption, (ii) combine insights from the sociology of markets and from studies of the role of economic thought in constructing markets, and (iii) investigate national and transnational regulations.

This article surveys contemporary trends in economic sociology, detailing how the emergence of the social embeddedness metaphor has led to various sub-disciplines in the field. Economic sociology depicts the market as a socially... more

This article surveys contemporary trends in economic sociology, detailing how the emergence of the social embeddedness metaphor has led to various sub-disciplines in the field. Economic sociology
depicts the market as a socially constructed feature, (a) structured by networks of social actors who compete, imitate, exploit, and cooperate with one another, (b) enabled and reproduced by social and political institutions according to (c) the basic rules of capitalist political economy, and (d) perceived and enacted by cognitive procedures and normative regimes entailing ideal types, professional language games, myths, and ritualistic processes.

"Do Economists Make Railway Economy?" We seek to determine the influence of economists on the restructuring of the French railway sector during the post-war decades. We focus more specifically on Maurice Allais’ so-called theory of... more

"Do Economists Make Railway Economy?"
We seek to determine the influence of economists on the restructuring of the French railway sector during the post-war decades. We focus more specifically on Maurice Allais’ so-called theory of "social efficiency", which played a key role in the reconstruction of the national railway but cannot alone account for it. This leads us to reconsider the mechanisms underlying an economist’s power of influence, and also to reassess the weight of structures, social relations and power struggles in the railway economy transformations that occurred during the “Trente Glorieuses”.

JSTOR is a not-for-profit service that helps scholars, researchers, and students discover, use, and build upon a wide range of content in a trusted digital archive. We use information technology and tools to increase productivity and... more

JSTOR is a not-for-profit service that helps scholars, researchers, and students discover, use, and build upon a wide range of content in a trusted digital archive. We use information technology and tools to increase productivity and facilitate new forms of scholarship. For more information about JSTOR, please contact support@jstor.org.

Practices within markets are widely regulated and sometimes contested on the basis of moral judgments. Moral entrepreneurs challenge markets and market practices while firms and industry actors defend them, leading to moral struggles... more

Practices within markets are widely regulated and sometimes contested on the basis of moral judgments. Moral entrepreneurs challenge markets and market practices while firms and industry actors defend them, leading to moral struggles opposing different orders of worth. Based on an historical case study, this paper develops a theoretical framework to study moral struggles in markets as social and political processes around commensurability. It identifies three core arenas in which moral struggles play out: ideas, where the morality of specific practices itself is contested and actors ground their moral claims in different institutional orders for legitimat- ion; the economy, where the market viability of changing moral standards is at stake; and politics, where commensuration reflects political power struggles. Through a socio-historical analysis of the fight against battery cages in Swiss egg production in the 1970s and 1980s, the study fleshes out how this moral struggle played out along these dimensions, focusing on the competing discourses, strategies, and tactics of the main moral entrepreneurs and industry associations.

Conceptualising the 'market idea' in the Indian media economy

What are these economic and social forces that foster prices? Instead of identifying the external forces that could impact the prices, we will explain prices by examining the social work led by economic actors to set up prices. Release... more

What are these economic and social forces that foster prices? Instead of identifying the external forces that could impact the prices, we will explain prices by examining the social work led by economic actors to set up prices. Release prices constitute a good case for analyzing the organizational and inter-organizational work led by wine producers because they seem to be based on short-term decisions made by disparate individuals under (economic and technical) constraints, while they are in fact the product of institutional factors and reputation-building carried out by multiple actors. This collective work can be made more visible by ethnographic fieldwork of the practices, categorizations and negotiations within the Bordeaux wine business, especially during the “futures campaign” in which economic actors have to deal with several uncertainties (productive, qualitative and commercial).

Anti-poaching measures, regulatory interventions and demand reduction campaigns have been instituted to curb the flow of illegal wildlife contraband. While these measures are laudable, they appear to achieve limited success in disrupting... more

Anti-poaching measures, regulatory interventions and demand reduction campaigns have been instituted to curb the flow of illegal wildlife contraband. While these measures are laudable, they appear to achieve limited success in disrupting illegal wildlife markets. Using the example of the illegal market in rhinoceros horn, this article focuses on security coordinating mechanisms that render illegal transnational flows of rhino horn resilient and difficult to disrupt. While analyses of legal or formal markets focus on the coordination problems of value, cooperation and competition, it is argued here that the need to exercise caution and implement a security plan becomes more pressing when transacting in illegal and transnational markets. The paper focuses on security precautions of illegal market actors at the source and en route to consumer markets. The label of ‘organised crime’ is of limited use unless the concept bridges the legal/illegal divide, incorporating actors from the legal and criminal realm. The objective is to highlight the need for a deeper understanding of actors and their relationships to develop regulatory and criminal justice interventions that disrupt illegal markets and transnational flows in the long term.

Market design poses a new challenge to scholars studying marketization and the organization of markets more generally. Market designers are practitioners whose work involves organizing situations in the image of the market. The challenge... more

Market design poses a new challenge to scholars studying marketization and the organization of markets more generally. Market designers are practitioners whose work involves organizing situations in the image of the market. The challenge (as the case of the re-organization of the school system presented in this paper shows) is how to account for the market market designers organize. To deal with this problem, social scientists must modify what is here called their “conceptual stance”. Normally, social researchers assume they know the concept of the market in advance. It is a concept they define, or, like in the performativity tradition, the assumption is that the market economists construct is the market of neo-classical economics. To better understand how market-designers organize markets, this paper proposes, researchers should treat the concept of the market as an incognita, a variable whose value will become clear after empirical study.

Avança politicamente no país a ideia de que Estados, ao interferirem excessivamente em mercados, distorcem preços, criam ineficiências e alimentam privilégios. No caso brasileiro, diante da crise econômica que se prolonga desde 2015,... more

Avança politicamente no país a ideia de que Estados, ao interferirem excessivamente em mercados, distorcem preços, criam ineficiências e alimentam privilégios. No caso brasileiro, diante da crise econômica que se prolonga desde 2015, reformas "prómercado" seriam cruciais para colocar o país nos eixos e, em suma, retomar o crescimento econômico. Ao menos é essa a conclusão repetida como obviedade no falatório oficial da imprensa e do governo. Em suas entrelinhas, revela-se (para além de um projeto articulado) o pressuposto de que o mercado é uma forma institucional perfeitamente dissociável da política e do Estado, que obedece a uma lógica própria. Nada poderia, contudo, estar mais distante do funcionamento de mercados concretos.

This study describes how the concept of trust is built within the market space. The bazaar, also known as haat belong to members of the Karbi community who live in an urban village of Guwahati. I had begun my study on the functioning of... more

This study describes how the concept of trust is built within the market space.
The bazaar, also known as haat belong to members of the Karbi community
who live in an urban village of Guwahati. I had begun my study on the
functioning of the market with an unstated assumption that it would be primarily
about the buying and selling of commodities every week. What I found was
that without the unstated presence of ‘trust’ and ‘belongingness’ which binds
the different stakeholders, the market would not function. The periodic market
functions every week with this trust and belonginess that is the glue that ties
community members on the basis of ethnicity. This paper draws upon what
one observed and what one gleaned through their narratives. It looks at how
the question of trust comes with a certain ‘social capital’ that helps them to be
a part of an active member of the market.

Existing accounts of consumer credit market making have done much to explore the business models, technologies and advertising practices of lenders, and the financial circumstances of borrowers. However, the space of interface between... more

Existing accounts of consumer credit market making have done much to explore the business models, technologies and advertising practices of lenders, and the financial circumstances of borrowers. However, the space of interface between consumer credit debtor and debt collector remains underexplored. Drawing on interviews with debtors and an exposition of debt collections technologies, the paper demonstrates how this market domain, in seeking to prompt calculative engagement, depends on its ability to intersect successfully with the everyday lives of economic agents. Critically engaging with key currents emerging out of the ‘economization’ programme it builds on its attention to the socio-material mechanisms of market making. However, the paper argues that materially sensitive economic sociologies need to account more thoroughly for the place of affect in markets. This is particularly relevant when studying consumer markets, where exchanges routinely centre on intimate and embodied encounters between economic actors.

In 2010, the Constitutional Tribunal of Chile dictated that "the risk table", which was used to differentiate premiums of insurance policies within the health insurance industry in that country, violated the constitutional right to an... more

In 2010, the Constitutional Tribunal of Chile dictated that "the risk table", which was used to differentiate premiums of insurance policies within the health insurance industry in that country, violated the constitutional right to an equal access to healthcare.1 The table was not strictly an invention of the insurers. It had been in use since a previous controversy, when regulators and insurance companies agreed that while the price of a similar policy could not change depending on the health condition of the potential user, it could vary depending on socio-demographic variables such as sex and age. The case of 2010, in turn, was based on the claim that charging a higher premium to young children, old people and women was discriminatory.

William James (1919) characterises hypotheses as either live or dead. A hypothesis is live when it is taken into account as a ‘real possibility’. We follow James’ suggestion to not attribute intrinsic properties to hypotheses, but rather... more

William James (1919) characterises hypotheses as either live or dead. A hypothesis is live when it is taken into account as a ‘real possibility’. We follow James’ suggestion to not attribute intrinsic properties to hypotheses, but rather investigate how they came into being and look at the effects they generate. Expectations of digital technologies are a topic of vivid debate in the insurance industry. Before these expectations can become ‘live’, they have, in the first place, to be generated by market devices. We investigate how the reinsurance blogpost platform Open Minds functions as an ‘expectation generation device’ on the future of insurance markets. Combining Beckert’s work on the role of fictional expectations with the pragmatist turn in sociology of markets, we propose to study ‘expectation generation devices’,
provoking expectations on economic markets. In our empirical analysis, we demonstrate the explicit fictional character of the Open Minds contributions, and analyse how a contained space of openness is generated to provoke expectations. We demonstrate how Open Minds can become live through circulation to other expectation generation sites in the insurance industry and beyond. We conclude by reflecting on the importance of expectation generation devices as a particular type of market devices.

¿Cómo se haCe un merCado?

Although new technologies of information and communication allow the emergence of new kinds of anonymous transactions that presumably do not need social ties to be performed, social ties are still relevant in financial markets even when... more

Although new technologies of information and communication allow the emergence of new kinds of anonymous transactions that presumably do not need social ties to be performed, social ties are still relevant in financial markets even when computerised trading seems more efficient. Need of getting first hand information about assets before the competitors and getting additional elements that allow framing public data seem to be factors that explain why ties survive in financial markets in the era of electronic trading.

Although the importance of New Institutional Economics and the institutional approach for understanding pre-industrial economic development and the early growth of markets are widely accepted, it has proven to be difficult to assess more... more

Although the importance of New Institutional Economics and the institutional approach for understanding pre-industrial economic development and the early growth of markets are widely accepted, it has proven to be difficult to assess more directly the effects of institutions on the functioning of markets. This paper uses empirical research on the rise of markets in late medieval Holland to illuminate some of the factors behind the development of the specific institutional framework of markets for land, labour, capital and goods, and some effects of these institutions on the actual functioning of the markets. The findings are corroborated by a tentative comparison with the functioning of markets in Flanders and eastern England.

La sociología económica estudia los aspectos fundamentales de la vida económica y del rol de los mercados en la sociedad, pero ello no se ha abordado convenientemente en América Latina. Se propone una agenda de investigación enfocada en... more

La sociología económica estudia los aspectos fundamentales de la vida económica y del rol de los mercados en la sociedad, pero ello no se ha abordado convenientemente en América Latina. Se propone una agenda de investigación enfocada en problemas como los mecanismos que definen las fronteras para los mercados;; la formación de mercados
específicos;; el vínculo entre dinamismo de los mercados y la estratificación social;; las formas de regulación de los mercados;; y los aspectos culturales e institucionales que modelan los mercados y la innovación. Se proveen ejemplos tomados de Chile, país que funciona como un caso extremo en materia de economía de mercado y de una estructura económica elitista y jerarquizada.

This article analyses the conditions of production and justification for systems of rail fares in France since the creation of the Société Nationale des Chemins de Fer Français (SNCF) (the French National Railway Company) in 1938.... more

This article analyses the conditions of production and justification for systems of rail fares in France since the creation of the Société Nationale des Chemins de Fer Français (SNCF) (the French National Railway Company) in 1938. Initially based on the principle of a uniform per-kilometre tariff, the historic tariff equalization system was gradually abandoned during the post-war decades in favour of tariff setting indexed to marginal costs. At the turn of the 1980s–90s, this paradigm was itself replaced by a real-time tariff setting mechanism—yield management—aimed at obtaining as much surplus per consumer as possible. The transformation of SNCF tariff models, which was accompanied by a redefinition of the highly polymorphic notion of “public service” railways, was the result of work by a few leading actors. These “price setters,” who used tools from economics as well as their own influence, acted in specific (political, social, technical and competitive) contexts that made their proposed innovations possible, necessary and legitimate.

La mise en marché de produits moralement sensibles, comme ceux touchant à l’intimité des personnes, à leur intégrité, à la santé ou au maintien de l’ordre public, est l’objet de cette réflexion collective qui met en regard neuf cas de «... more

La mise en marché de produits moralement sensibles, comme ceux touchant à l’intimité des personnes, à leur intégrité, à la santé ou au maintien de l’ordre public, est l’objet de cette réflexion collective qui met en regard neuf cas de « marchés contestés ».
Certains de ces marchés contestés sont effectifs, comme dans le cas du tabac, de la pornographie, des jeux d’argent ou des défunts. Certains sont potentiels dans le sens où les poissons génétiquement modifiés, les données personnelles ou le cannabis sont à la recherche des moyens de rendre acceptables les transactions marchandes. D’autres, enfin, sont bannis car la marchandisation des enfants adoptés ou des organes humains reste moralement inacceptable.
La tension entre les principes marchands et moraux au cœur des marchés contestés est dans chaque contribution éclairée par l’identification des formes de la contestation morale et des dispositifs juridiques, fiscaux, sanitaires, éthiques, rendant possible ou au contraire irréalisable l’édification d’un marché. La prise en compte de « populations fragiles », qu’il s’agit de protéger du marché, mais aussi de protéger par le marché, émerge dans tous les chapitres comme un élément explicatif essentiel des avancées et des reculs des marchés contestés.

based on the fact that the concept of expectation is marginalized in economic sociology, where action and communication theories dominate, this paper re ects on the potential of expectations or, more precisely, expected expectations. in... more

based on the fact that the concept of expectation is marginalized in economic sociology, where action and communication theories dominate, this paper re ects on the potential of expectations or, more precisely, expected expectations. in pursuing this objective the author works out the characteristics of expected expectations as the foundation of social structure in general and market structure in particular, with a special focus on social change. considering the assumption that expectations shape action and communication on the one hand, and given theoretical compatibility on the other, there is, therefore, every indication that an appropriate expectation theory should be elaborated -with the exception of Popitz's objection. Heinrich Popitz argues against highlighting expectations in theory because of the methodological problem that one cannot prove whether one specific expectation leads to a specific behaviour. The author counterposes two arguments against Popitz's position: First, expected expectations are made observable, hence they can be expected. Whilst we are focusing on second-order expectations there is no methodological issue. and secondly, the clou of this paper is that expected expectations finally reveal their social power on the basis of an 'as-if' logic: actors can legitimately be treated as if they orientate themselves towards expected expectations, e.g. on the basis of formal or informal rules, and this guarantees (temporary) stability.

Dans quelles situations les individus se retrouvent-ils confrontés à des êtres, des institutions ou des systèmes qui les dépassent ? Comment y font-ils référence ? Quelles solutions théoriques les sciences sociales mobilisent-elles pour... more

Dans quelles situations les individus se retrouvent-ils confrontés à des êtres, des institutions ou des systèmes qui les dépassent ? Comment y font-ils référence ? Quelles solutions théoriques les sciences sociales mobilisent-elles pour en parler ? Ce numéro regroupe des contributions empiriques et théoriques qui étudient les modes d’existence et d’apparition des êtres collectifs quand ils sont envisagés comme des vecteurs d’action. Une tension centrale traverse toutes les disciplines représentées : d’un côté, on se prémunit méthodologiquement contre toute substantialisation des êtres collectifs, de l’autre on va au-delà de cette précaution pour les faire agir. Cette tension est d’autant plus sensible que les sciences sociales n’ont aucunement le privilège de mobiliser des entités collectives : les personnes ordinaires ne cessent de les convoquer ou de les combattre. En étudiant des êtres aussi différents que le capitalisme, les marchés, l’État, les corps délibérants, l’Église, La Poste ou encore les Nicolotti dans la Venise du XVIIIe siècle, les articles, traductions et entretien présents dans ce numéro montrent la variété des manières de convoquer de telles entités.

) xii + 314pp. A wander around the fruit and vegetable section of a typical British supermarket quickly reveals how visible and contested the category of consumer seems to be becoming in this country-in food retailing at least. Union... more

) xii + 314pp. A wander around the fruit and vegetable section of a typical British supermarket quickly reveals how visible and contested the category of consumer seems to be becoming in this country-in food retailing at least. Union Jacks proudly herald the Britishness of select produce, whilst others proclaim their 'organic' heritage, or their participation in 'fair' methods of trade. Amongst the complex interplay of factors feeding into the calculations around what and whether to buy, groups of British consumers are being asked to incorporate debates around, for example, the ethics of trade, environmentalism and patriotism.

Emissions trading schemes have gained an important degree of momentum in recent years, rapidly becoming mainstream solutions to deal with the negative environmental consequences of human activity such as pollution and global warming.... more

Emissions trading schemes have gained an important degree of momentum in recent years, rapidly becoming mainstream solutions to deal with the negative environmental consequences of human activity such as pollution and global warming. However there is still little empirical knowledge about what specific kind of work emissions trading schemes do. Using the analytical tools provided by science and technology studies, especially developments studying markets and economic practices, this paper looks to contribute to filling this void by exploring three kinds of work that emissions trading schemes might do: performing a textbook market of emissions permits, performing a civilized market in which a multitude of heterogeneous actors participate and as exemplars of the validity of certain economic knowledge. In order to explore the usability of this conceptualization the paper will then analyze one of earliest concrete implementations of this device: an emissions trading scheme introduced to deal with industrial air pollution in the city of Santiago (Chile) in the early 1990s. Through a historical genealogy, it will show this emissions trading scheme working not mainly as a textbook market, but as a civilized one and as a powerful exemplar that helped to mobilize both command-and-control regulation and neoliberal environmental economics to/from Chile and elsewhere.

RESUMO Abordagens institucionalistas da sociologia econômica mostram que Estados arquitetam mercados e revelam, assim, a variedade de configurações institucionais da relação Estados-mercados em diferentes países. Menos atenção tem sido... more

RESUMO Abordagens institucionalistas da sociologia econômica mostram que Estados arquitetam mercados e revelam, assim, a variedade de configurações institucionais da relação Estados-mercados em diferentes países. Menos atenção tem sido dada, contudo, aos processos pelos quais Estados, em meio a dinâmicas políticas, constroem, estruturam e regulam tais mercados. Neste artigo, argumentamos que uma razão subjacente a isso é o fato de que o direito, embora por vezes referido, é insuficientemente considerado nesses estudos. O argumento é desenvolvido a partir de um diálogo com os trabalhos de Dobbin, Fligstein e Vogel. Defendemos que tomar o fenômeno jurídico (i) como constitutivo de mercados e da ação estatal; (ii) como parte da disputa social em torno da institucionalidade; e (iii) como mecanismo estruturante das relações entre os planos doméstico e internacional, contribui, do ponto de vista analítico, para melhor compreender o processo social que subjaz à arquitetura de mercados.

This paper is based on an ethnographic enquiry conducted over the last four years and shows the setting of a close interaction between hosts and guests in the White Tai villages in Mai Chau district, in the northwest uplands of Vietnam.... more

This paper is based on an ethnographic enquiry conducted over the last four years and shows the setting of a close interaction between hosts and guests in the White Tai villages in Mai Chau district, in the northwest uplands of Vietnam. The author argues that tourism is utilised as a medium to demonstrate a culture of hospitality. A new trend in tourism production and consumption is brought into discussion; in relation to this, this paper looks at what is really happening in the tourism spaces of the White Tai villages through the experiences not only of tourists but also of villagers. The author identifi es several types of host-guest relationships and argues that there is a transformation of the host-guest relationship within these tourist spaces, a transformation evident in the new production and consumption practices of the market. Such relationships must be understood by looking beyond conceptions of commodifi cation and politicisation of ethnicity.