China and world anthropology: A conversation on the legacy of Fei Xiaotong (1910–2005) (Respond to this article at http://www.therai.org.uk/at/debate)

Fei Xiaotong (Fei Hsiao‐Tung, 1910–2005) obtained his PhD under Bronislaw Malinowski's supervision at the London School of Economics in 1938. Of the 20 volumes of his completed works, two books are well‐known in the West: Peasant life in China, published in English in 1939, and Xiangtu zhingguo (1947), translated as From the soil by Gary Hamilton and Zheng Wang in 1992. As one of China's finest sociologists and anthropologists, Fei was instrumental in laying a solid foundation for the development of sociological and anthropological studies in China, and his work helped to influence China's social and economic development. This is a translated, abridged and revised version of a conversation originally conducted in English, but published in Chinese to commemorate the 100th anniversary of the birth of Fei Xiaotong. Wu Zitong, the editor of China Reading Weekly, puts a series of questions to Gary Hamilton and Xiangqun Chang.     

Credit unions and money clubs (ROSCAs) (Respond to this article at http://www.therai.org.uk/at/debate)

This article responds to the Archbishop of Canterbury's high profile endorsements of credit unions and his strong stance against so‐called payday loan companies charging high rates of interest. His views have received wide press coverage along with responses by payday loan companies. This article looks at research on Rotating Savings and Credit Associations (ROSCA) which flourish in communities frequented by anthropologists worldwide to meet the financial needs of participants. Unlike credit unions, most ROSCAs do not charge interest.     

The euro crisis and European citizenship: The euro 2001–2012 – celebration or commemoration? (Respond to this article at http://www.therai.org.uk/at/debate)

The Eurozone crisis has highlighted the problems of European economic integration, but what effects is it having on social cohesion in the European Union? Using symbolic, historical and anthropological perspectives this article examines the relationship between the single currency and European citizenship. I argue that the roots of the crisis lie in the euro's origins. Economic and monetary union (EMU) was an assemblage of two very different rationales: one economic and based on neoliberal assumptions, the other political and geared towards forging social cohesion among Europeans. Binding Europe through a common currency was always a risky endeavour, placing heavy expectations on the identity‐effects of money. EU leaders also seemed curiously oblivious to the possible negative effects that weaknesses in the euro might have for European solidarity. Drawing on theories of money and its role as a technology of citizenship and symbolic boundary marker, I argue that the euro continues to symbolize European integration, only now it has come to symbolize the cleavages and tensions that divide Europe. Paradoxically, one effect of the Eurozone crisis is not fragmentation but an acceleration of the deepening of European economic governance. However, the centralization this entails imposes heavy costs on the EU's peripheral members and raises concerns about the future of democracy in Europe.     

Claude Lévi‐Strauss (1908–2009): The apotheosis of heroic anthropology (Respond to this article at http://www.therai.org.uk/at/debate)

Claude Lévi‐Strauss is one of the greatest interdisciplinary writers of the twentieth century whose influence extends far beyond his own discipline of social anthropology. His inquiry illuminates the borderlands between ‘primitive’ and non‐primitive, self and other, myth and history, human and animal, art and nature, and the dichotomies that give structure to culture, society, history and agency. This commemorative article of his legacy assesses disciplinary and interdisciplinary debates influenced by Levi‐Strauss's inquiry and methods, and looks at potential challenges for the future. Lévi‐Strauss's ideas continue to be influential in our assessments of what we mean by culture, values, social organization, including social transformations and cultural ideologies such as ethnocentrism, nationalism, fundamentalism, pluralism, neo‐liberalism, post‐modernism, relativism, humanism and universalism.     

#spanishrevolution (Respond to this article at http://www.therai.org.uk/at/debate)

The article reports on the street protests that took over Spanish cities earlier in May and June. The protests have been explained as a response on the part of new media democratic networks to the governance of the economic crises by corrupt political and financial classes. We offer here a tentative chronology of the events, and essay instead an argument about a revitalised municipalist tradition, that sees in the plaza the centrepiece of new forms of do‐it‐yourself political action.     

Writing development (Respond to this article at http://www.therai.org.uk/at/debate)

Development professionals spend a lot of time writing and the aid industry has a vast production of texts. The author argues here that anthropology of development needs to look anew at how these texts are being produced, circulated and the purposes they serve. I have briefly identified six features of development writing: 1. Institutional ownership, 2. multiple authorship, 3. impersonal style, 4. terminology, 5. Communicable simplifications and 6. temporality. The more general point is to call for a more sophisticated engagement with development texts. There might be more going on in these documents than immediately meets the eye. More than anything else, these texts grant legitimacy and presence to the actors involved in development. Writing development is more about the production process, the language and what it ultimately bring in terms of aid flows, rather than the substance of the text itself.     

Charity plus (Respond to this article at http://www.therai.org.uk/at/debate)

This editorial takes to task a statement on humanitarianism by Valerie Amos, UN Under‐Secretary‐General for Humanitarian Affairs and Emergency Relief Coordinator, which seems to gloss over issues to do with staff selection and management policies, but especially the work of veteran anthropologists in the field of development and alternative perspectives on humanitarianism.     

Imperative Eurasia (Respond to this article at http://www.therai.org.uk/at/debate)

The end of the Cold War marked the apogee of Western global domination, but this has since come under increasing threat, notably through the rise of China. To preserve the values of European social democracy, it makes more sense to negotiate new rules of political economy with multiple centres of power across Eurasia than to plunge deeper into a free trade zone with North America. Current European institutions are unable to respond to this new challenge; nor are the institutions of sociocultural anthropology in Europe conducive to a balanced, historically informed perspective on the super‐continent, Eurasia.     

Confucius institutes (Respond to this article at http://www.therai.org.uk/at/debate)

Many hundreds Confucius Institutes have mushroomed in higher education centres all over the world. In this comment, Marshall Sahlins continues his analysis of troublesome aspects of these institutions and considers what anthropologists have come up with in terms of research on these so far. He also touches on the Canadian campaign for university teachers to boycott these. James Turk commends Marshall Sahlins for looking into the issue of academic freedom in relation to Confucius Institutes. This is part of a campaign by the Canadian Association of University Teachers to secure academic freedom where universities enter into collaboration with third parties.     

Economic deviance (Respond to this article at http://www.therai.org.uk/at/debate)

Making sense of what went wrong during the recent financial crises requires us to go beyond the conventional view of deviance. We need a more systematic and social view of financial deviance, and have long had the intellectual tools to do so. They include Durkheim and Merton's work, invoked here to pose pertinent questions about the deviant behaviour of corporations and institutions.     

Talking to strangers (Respond to this article at http://www.therai.org.uk/at/debate)

The language used by politicians and its social effects have been of long‐standing interest to social anthropology. Opinion‐formers on both sides of the North Atlantic have recently argued that this language can inflame tensions and reinforce divisions. In the UK, the discussion has centred on relations between a white majority and a Muslim minority, while in the US, in the aftermath of the attempted assassination of a Democratic Congresswoman in Arizona, it has focused on the risk of political language provoking violence. The antidote to inflammatory language is often assumed to be moderation, defined as a (self‐) disciplined engagement with divided publics. Drawing on the insights of Danielle Allen's Talking to strangers, here I suggest that moderation might be re‐imagined, not as a vague commitment to centrism and the ‘middle ground’, but as a powerful resource for citizens and communities to challenge the ideological excesses of politics, religion and the market in the twenty‐first century.     

Scapegoating in Burma (Respond to this article at http://www.therai.org.uk/at/debate)

This guest editorial considers the attacks on the Rohingyas and Muslims in the wake of liberalization in Burma.     

Scientology's winning streak (Respond to this article at http://www.therai.org.uk/at/debate)

In this editorial the author considers the effect of recent legal judgments enabling Scientology weddings in England.     

Back to civilization (Respond to this article at http://www.therai.org.uk/at/debate)

This editorial reinforces recent calls for anthropologists to participate more actively in multidisciplinary reappraisals of the concept of civilization. Beyond the dominant relativist model of discrete cultures and historical accounts of complex trading networks across the Eurasian landmass, it is important to recognize the civilizational coagulations that sustained such networks. The challenge is how to explain the dogged persistence of civilizational boundaries in the face of continuous contacts between them, accelerated by modern means of communication.