Blog
The REALEURASIA Blog is edited by the three senior members of the project (Chris Hann, Sylvia Terpe and Lale Yalçın-Heckmann). It features research funded by the European Research Council under the European Union's Seventh Programme, ERC Grant Agreement No. 340854 (REALEURASIA). The blog has the following functions:
- To link the anthropological themes and historical vision of the project to current affairs (international relations, political economy etc.)
- To document field research and disseminate research results in accessible form for a broad public
- To chronicle project-related events (panels, workshops etc)
In Spring 2020 it was decided to open up this blog (the sole instrument of its kind available in the Department) to guest contributions engaging with any aspect of the ongoing Covid-19 pandemic, in the spirit of a creative public anthropology.
A final report on the REALEURASIA project was submitted to ERC in August, but this forum will remain open until the end of 2020 for contributions connecting directly with the ongoing pandemic, or with the many other topics we have broached in the last six years.
Authors: Chris Hann and Lale Yalçın-HeckmannDecember 17, 2020
The “Realising Eurasia” project was formally concluded in June 2020. Two more doctoral theses have been defended recently (bringing the total so far up to five). As the year of the Great Pandemic draws to a close and we conclude a century of blogposts, a stocktaking is in order: both of our social scientific results, and of the state of Eurasia.
Photo: Group picture, from left: Chris Hann, Sylvia Terpe, Ceren Deniz, Lale Yalçın-Heckmann and Sudeshna Chaki (Photo: MPI for Social Anthropology).
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Author: Sudeshna ChakiDecember 10, 2020
The crisis that India is witnessing was not created by the pandemic or the ensuing lockdown. Rather, Covid-19 has exposed the systematic exclusion from citizenship rights that has always been the fate of migrant workers.
Photo: Factory workers in Palghar, India (Photo: Sudeshna Chaki).
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Authors: Nina Nissen, Ingrid Charlotte Andersen, Charlotte SimonÿNovember 24, 2020
Many of us wonder how to make sense of rising and falling infection and reproduction rates and understand the diverse and ever-shifting pandemic measures in our countries of residence and internationally. The COVID-19 infection, also in its post-acute phase, brings with it much bodily, affective and social uncertainty and unpredictability, as our anthropological research in Denmark indicates.
Photo: Family dogs, waiting (Source: see information in text).
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Author: Chris HannNovember 10, 2020
The election of a new president in the United States provides an opportunity to reflect on deeper contradictions of our political economy, which have their proximate origins in Europe (western Eurasia). This particular election result may have hinged on (mis-)management of a pandemic. The circumstances invite comparison with a decisive moment in the family history of President Joe Biden.
Photos: Potato Blight and Coronavirus (Sources: https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Phytophtora_infestans-effects.jpg; https://unsplash.com/photos/w9KEokhajKw).
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Author: Lale Yalçın-HeckmannOctober 21, 2020
If rising rates of covid-19 infection continue to dominate the news in Europe, since the end of September with the outbreak of heavy clashes between Azerbaijan and the Armenians of Nagorno-Karabakh one might suppose that the pandemic has receded into the background. Not at all!
Image: Overview of Nagorno-Karabakh (Source: https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:AZ-qa-location-en.svg).
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Author: Attila MeleghSeptember 1, 2020
Statistical modeling shows that the rise of foreign direct investment plays a significant role in the rise of emigration in some societies, though the impact follows with a lengthy lag of 10-15 years. Our research has pinpointed the decisive co-variables: migration path dependency, the decline of agricultural labor, and changes in the relative income levels of countries and regions. The opening up of national economies in the globalization process must be analyzed with reference to the interplay between these variables.
Figure/ Source: see information in text.
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Author: Biao XiangJuly 17, 2020
Delivery and logistics platforms are expanding rapidly as many of us ‘outsource’ our mobilities to others, which may in turn change how society is organized and how political power operates.
Image: "Running Legs for You" (
paotui daiban): An online Chinese advertisement for errand-running services. (Source: https://item.taobao.com/item.htm?spm=a21wu. 10013406.0.0.2d275bcfjCqdta&id=611041588432).
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Author: Ceren Deniz
July 14, 2020
Statistics can be manipulated and ignored, but it is not so easy to ignore the voices of real people. The possibility that the courage of Malik Yılmaz, a Turkish lorry driver, might prove contagious must be alarming for the class politics of the state.
Photo: Malik Yılmaz after his release on 29th March 2020. (Source: http://bianet.org/english/labor/222198-briefly-detained-for-stay-home-video-truck-driver-yilmaz-i-think-i-lose-my-job-too-).
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Author: Milana CergicJuly 6, 2020
In the first weeks of the Covid-19 pandemic in Europe, Bosnia and Herzegovina reacted rapidly by taking the crisis seriously and implementing protective measures. There was hope that Covid-19 would be contained. However, recently there has been a drastic rise in cases around the country, making the outcome of the crisis more uncertain than ever.
Photo: Statues of the famous Bosnian writer Meša Selimović and painter Ismet Mujezinović, in the empty streets of Tuzla's city centre (Credits: Dino Šakanović).
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Author: Kirsten W. EndresJune 26, 2020
Vietnam has been remarkably successful during the Covid-19 crisis. Strategic testing, aggressive contact tracing, mass quarantining and effective public information campaigns have all been key to the country’s achievement in fighting the pandemic. Until very recently, the only person who could have possibly spoiled this positive record was a British pilot who became known as Vietnam's Covid-19 Patient No. 91.
Image: Propaganda poster promoting prevention against COVID-19 in Hanoi, Vietnam. (Source: https://tuoitre.vn/tin-gia-ganh-hau-qua-that-vao-tranh-co-dong-phong-chong-covid-19-20200328211100115.htm).
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Author: Samuel J. WilliamsJune 24, 2020
While Keck’s new monograph illuminates a vital difference between the way countries in East Asia have prepared for the threat of a pandemic compared with states in Europe, the last few months have also revealed stark differences between epidemic responses within Europe.
Historians who have studied the science and politics of earlier pandemics in Europe sometimes draw on the work of an anthropologist who is not widely read today in anthropology. Erwin Akerknecht wasn’t the first to ask why European states so often ‘follow’ epidemic science differently from one another, but his comparative study of responses to cholera offered one of the most enduring answers to the question – the Ackerknecht Thesis.
Photo: Erwin Heinz Ackerknecht in 1931. (Photo: UZH Archives; Source: https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Erwin_H._Ackerknecht_1931.jpg)
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Author: Samuel J. WilliamsJune 17, 2020
While governments responding to COVID-19 have been almost of one voice in assuring us that they are ‘following the science’, what the science is has seemed to vary, unreassuringly, from country to country.
What is the relation between the science of epidemiology and the politics of epidemic response? And what help, if any, as we worry over this question, is anthropology?
In this two part post, I follow how a couple of anthropologists have thought comparatively about the relationship between science and politics in previous pandemics. Next time, I’ll discuss an early twentieth scholar whose formative anthropological studies of medicine never quite made it into any canon. This week, by contrast, I focus on a book hot off the press…
Image: 'Avian Reservoirs' (https://www.amazon.de/Avian-Reservoirs-Birdwatchers-Sentinel-Experimental-ebook/dp/B0837NF1Y1).
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Author: Agnieszka PasiekaJune 4, 2020
Discussions about “dramatic changes” brought by the COVID-19 pandemic are covering up the “politics as usual” observable in dealing with its consequences. Asparagus stories provide a lens through which to investigate the complex intersections between nationalist attachments, economic imperatives, and transnational inequalities.
Image: 'I am not a virus' (by Lisa Wool-Rim Sjöblom, comic book artist, illustrator and adoptee rights activist).
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Author: Katerina IvanovaMay 29, 2020
The Belarusian government’s controversial response to the Coronavirus threat and the absence of social distancing measures have been widely mocked in the international media. However, the responses and everyday practices of the Belarusian population amid the Covid-19 pandemic have been diverse. They include a civil initiative predicated on volunteering.
Photo: Independence Day Parade in 2019 in Minsk. (Photo: Mil.ru; Source:
https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/Category:2019_Belarusian_Independence_ Day_Parade_in_Minsk#/media/File:Парад_в_Беларуси_2019_04.jpg)
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Author: Steve Sampson May 25, 2020
The corona emergency exposed the soft underbelly of our societies; but it’s the reopening that can tell us what crisis and resilience are really about.
Photo: The author has recently applied for Danish citizenship after 41 years of residence (photo by his spouse Inger Thorun Hjelmervik, who is Norwegian).
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Author: Gábor ScheiringMay 19, 2020
Since 2010, Viktor Orbán has established a stable illiberal government in Hungary. His populist style of rule has been reflected in his approach to the corona-crisis. The government’s socio-economic responses should not be attributed to culture or cronyism, but to its deeper authoritarian capitalist agenda which I call Orbanomics.
Photo: Just a hospital in Hungary. (Photo: https://9gag.com/; Source: https://dailynewshungary.com/the-whole-internet-outraged-by-a-hungarian-hospital/).
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Author: Mark Harvey
May 15, 2020
Pandemics test out the fault lines in our political and economic systems. And in the not-so United Kingdom, there are plenty of fault lines, resulting in now the highest level of deaths per capita in Europe. Here the continuing tragedy in United Kingdom care homes is addressed.
(Photo: https://pixabay.com/de/photos/hand-menschlichen-frau-erwachsene-3666974/)
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Author: Mark HarveyMay 12, 2020
Pandemics test out the fault lines in our political and economic systems. And in the not-so United Kingdom, there are plenty of fault lines, resulting in now the highest level of deaths per capita in Europe. I will briefly pick out just two, first bogus self-employment where the pandemic has resulted in the threat of instant destitution. The second, to follow, is about care homes, which are witnessing catastrophic levels of mortality.
Photo: Construction workers. (Created by
Elvis Pucar; Source: https://ccsearch. creativecommons.org/photos/64d53135-6519-47b6-bfcf-6eb8849b7c49).
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Author: Nikolaos OlmaMay 7, 2020
In Greece, the government responded to the COVID-19 pandemic by enforcing a rather strict lockdown. The subsequent immobility of most of the population increased the need for goods to be delivered to their door and hence enhanced the numbers as well as the mobility flows of motorbike delivery workers. Yet, the informality and precariousness that characterises the lives of these individuals has, amidst the pandemic, become a health hazard for both themselves and the rest of the population.
Photo: The empty streets of Athens (Photo: Nikolaos Olma).
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Author: Roger JefferyMay 4, 2020
The Indian government has used Covid-19 to close down sites of opposition to its right-wing Hindu nationalist policies, and to attack those most affected by them. Journalists who draw attention to the one-sided approach to implementing Covid-19 control policies are threatened by absurd accusations, designed to shut them up. Muslims, and to a lesser extent, Christians, people from North-East India and those from ex-Untouchable castes have been specific targets. More generally they have also been attacked: beaten up for being on the streets, often when they have nowhere else to go.
Photo: Many carried belongings in plastic bags normally used for cement, while women in saris carried infants on their hips. (Photo: Danish Siddiqui/ Reuters; Source: https://www.aljazeera.com/indepth/inpictures/pictures-india-poor-struggle-coronavirus-lockdown-200329133626495.html).
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Author: Frank N. PiekeApril 30, 2020
China and the US have been at each other’s throats for years now. While at first the corona crisis seemed to end the escalation and confrontation, both superpowers are now gravitating back to the former antagonisms. But will the US and China still be the same countries after the crisis, and can things ever be normal again?
Photo: Chinese President Xi Jinping wearing a protective facemask as a health official checks his temperature at the Anhuali Community in Beijing (Photo released Feb. 10, 2020; Credit: JU PENG/ XINHUA/AFP) (Source: https://www.france24.com/en/20200210-china-s-xi-dons-mask-for-rare-hospital-visit-as-more-than-900-die-of-coronavirus).
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Author: Thomas Hylland Eriksen
April 27, 2020
In a deceptively soft-spoken, polite way, Sweden is a very progressive country. Committed to scientific rationality, global solidarity and citizen participation, the country has implemented some of the most radical policies on the planet. The controversial Swedish Coronavirus policy, fronted by State Epidemiologist Anders Tegnell, has surprised many, but it is consistent with Swedish modernity.
Photo: Anders Tegnell during the daily press conference outside the Karolinska Institute in Stockholm, Sweden on
20 April 2020 (Photo: Frankie Fouganthin; Source: https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Anders_Tegnell_in_2020.jpg).
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Author: Lale Yalçın-Heckmann April 22, 2020
In Turkey daily coronavirus statistics for the whole country have been published since 11th March. Like other countries, Turkey has established crisis management teams. Yet political tensions and social polarization seem to spill over to affect management of this crisis. The government moved on 21st March to confine those aged over 65 to their homes; it imposed the same measure on those aged under 20 on 3 April. Consumers and workers experience the pandemic in different ways according to their social stratum (or class), while temporary agricultural labourers are especially vulnerable.
Photo: The municipality of Istanbul explaining the rules for preventing the pandemic (Photo: Maurice Flesier; Source: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:A_brochure_ about_14_rules_taken_against_the_risk_of_coronavirus_in_Turkey.jpg).
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Author: James G. CarrierApril 16, 2020
The virus has brought countries to a halt, and we tell ourselves that when it is over things will be different. But a focus on the virus and its baleful effects can distract us from its context. That is the forces and factors that shape how countries deal with it, explain it and understand it and its consequences. The virus is unlikely to affect that context, and when it is done we are likely to see business as usual.
Photo: Coronavirus (Source: https://pixabay.com/illustrations/virus-pathogen-infection-biology-4958150/).
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Author: Sylvia TerpeApril 6, 2020
Although these times are unusual, many of the present social problems are not caused by the coronavirus. These problems merely become particularly visible through the corona glow. Three Examples are given from Germany: the inadequate social security of small business owners, the exploitative working conditions of seasonal workers from abroad, and the strain of home office in families with children.
Photo: A child climbing at the walls of the university library in Halle (Germany) while kindergartens, schools and public playgrounds are closed (Photo: Sylvia Terpe).
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Author: Chris HannMarch 30, 2020
The spread of the coronavirus has implications for perceptions of social equality, community, the state and even for geopolitical alliances. China, where the virus originated, appears to be dealing with the crisis more successfully than western Eurasia, where inter-state solidarity is conspicuously lacking. The pandemic could mark a turning point in neoliberal globalization. On an optimistic view, the emphatic normative reassertion of the nation-state’s duty of care toward all citizens, far from fueling right-wing extremists, will take the wind out of their sails.
Photo: Coronavirus (Source: https://unsplash.com/photos/w9KEokhajKw).
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Author: Chris HannFebruary 3, 2020
The United Kingdom has finally left the European Union. Yet there is general agreement that “Britain has not left Europe” and even some speculation as to when the offshore island might return. In this post I argue that my native country should never return to a Brussels-based EU. Rather, the United Kingdom should be pro-active in establishing a new Eurasian Union.
Image: Union Jack and Japanese flag (Sources: https://pixabay.com/de/vectors/japan-flagge-asien-nationalen-26803/; https://pixabay.com/de/vectors/union-jack-flagge-k%C3%B6nigliche-flagge-26119/).
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Author: Chris HannDecember 16, 2019
Xinjiang is formally an autonomous region of the People’s Republic of China, in which the Muslim Uyghur are the titular nationality. The repressive policies of the present leadership in Beijing have been criticized in Washington; but the recent NATO summit in London follows tradition and targets only Russia for general rebuke. Meanwhile the presence of Volkswagen in Urumchi (provincial capital of the XUAR) is a clue to explaining the timidity of German policy, while exemplifying contemporary Eurasian and global connectivity.
Images: NATO Logo (Source: https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:NATO_OTAN_ landscape_logo.svg?uselang=de); Volkswagen Logo (Source: https://logos.fandom.com/wiki/File:Vw_logo_2019.svg).
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Author: Daria TereshinaDecember 10, 2019
Since 2018, the construction of a waste landfill at the railway station of Shiyes (south Arkhangelsk region, northwest Russia) has triggered mass demonstrations that have received much attention in the oppositional press and on social media. Ecological hazards have galvanized political action in many parts of the world, but in this post I show that the concerns of the protestors in northwest Russia cannot be grasped without addressing larger issues of governance and domination in Russia.
Image: Protestors' sign (
Say no to the Moscow garbage in the north). (Source: https://stop-shies-arh.blogspot.com/p/blog-page_4.html).
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Author: Chris HannSeptember 2, 2019
Fifty years ago this month, interrupting decades of conservative dominance, the Social Democrat Willy Brandt (1913-1992) was elected Chancellor of the Federal Republic of Germany. His achievements in domestic politics were considerable but abroad he is remembered above all for his
neue Ostpolitik, a political opening to the other Germany and to the Soviet bloc of which it was part. This contributed to the ending of the Cold War twenty years later. Thirty years on the world needs another new vision, this time at the level of the Eurasian landmass.
Photo: Willy Brandt (Source: Bundesarchiv, B 145 Bild-F057884-0009 / Engelbert Reineke / CC-BY-SA 3.0)
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Author: Lale Yalçın-Heckmann July 11, 2019
The re-run of the Istanbul mayoral election on 23 June 2019 drew much attention in Turkey and in the international news. Some have assessed the re-election of the oppositional candidate Imamoğlu as evidence of Turkish democracy’s maturity (the position of the ruling Justice and Development Party, AKP); others see the defeat of the AKP candidate Yıldırım as a sign of President Erdoğan’s weakness and the failure of his authoritarian rule (AKP-critical voices).
Photo: Protests at Gezi Park
(Source: Wikipedia)
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Author: Chris HannJuly 3, 2019
Following parliamentary elections in May, the appointment of new leaders of the European Union is ruffling feathers. Two aspects are discussed in this post: first, the internal cleavage that results in the Visegrád states claiming victory, even though not a single top job is going to an East European; second, a pan-Eurasian comparison concerning democratic legitimacy and the reproduction of political elites.
Photos: Ursula von der Leyen (Source: https://www.cducsu.de/abgeordnete/ursula-leyen [Fotograf CDU/Jan Kopetzky]) and Charles Michel (Source: http://premier.fgov.be/nl/biografie).
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Author: Chris HannJune 19, 2019
Two books published almost simultaneously towards the end of the Second World War in the Anglosphere, by authors who shared intellectual roots in Vienna, offered diametrically opposed interpretations of the causes of civilizational collapse and recipes for how to secure the future. Seventy-five years later, in a world in which (according to numerous commentators) the threat of new forms of fascism must again be taken seriously, it is instructive to compare the messages of Karl Polanyi and Friedrich August Hayek.
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Author: Chris HannApril 24, 2019
Spring 2019 has seen the successful defences of the first doctoral dissertations of the Realising Eurasia project, one located in Europe (Anne-Erita Berta, far left) and one in Asia (Laura Hornig, near left). It also brought the reassuring news that the ERC has extended the project by one year, allowing us to complete our programme by Summer 2020. This post reflects on where Eurasia might be by then.
(Photos: MPI for Social Anthropology)
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Author: Laura HornigApril 23, 2019
Critical attitudes toward taxation do not necessarily mean that people reject redistribution or investments in public goods. In Myanmar, where tax revenue is low, many people regularly donate and charity projects mitigate hardship.
Photo: A new well in an orphanage run by Buddhist monks in Pathein (Photo: Malcolm Baird, 2017).
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Author: Anne-Erita G. BertaFebruary 27, 2019
In a guest Editorial in
Anthropology Today, Chris Hann (2019) informs us that the rise in nationalist populism in Hungary today ‘is a product of neo-liberal EU institutions which have reduced the country to a new state of peripheral dependency’. He explains this with Hungary becoming member of the European Union and how the expectations of increased material wealth were never met. The reasons for growth of populist (xenophobic) nationalism in Hungary are easy to detect if you know just a little about the country’s political and economic history. But the rise in xenophobic nationalism in Denmark can hardly be explained in the same way.
Photo: '
Boller i karri' (meatballs in curry) is considered a 'national dish' in Denmark, where the spice curry in many homes is considered the most vital spice. Few reflect on the origin of the spice or the fact it was fairly recently introduced in Denmark (Photo: Anne-Erita Berta).
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Authors: Chris Hann and Lale Yalçın-HeckmannFebruary 7, 2019
The last major Workshop of the “Realising Eurasia” project was titled “Social Relations of the Capitalocene”. The goal was to enable team members to present the results of their empirical studies in wider contexts: spatial, temporal and theoretical. Timed to coincide with the annual meeting of the World Economic Forum in Davos, Switzerland, participants explored the evident failure of dominant growth models in the interlinked dimensions of political economy and ecology, along with many other trends (mostly troubling) in the contemporary world.
Photo: Snowless in Davos. (Credit: Archiv SLF)
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Author: Chris HannSeptember 14, 2018
There are solid grounds for concern about political trends in Hungary. But a lot of the criticism from the West, such as the recent approval of the “Sargentini Report” by the European Parliament, fails to address the deeper factors that mobilize the majority of Hungarians (and many others) behind the populist policies of Viktor Orbán. A perspective from the provinces illuminates the economic imbalances and contradictions of the contemporary EU. A focus on citizens’ rights and
illiberalism is insufficient if not accompanied by an analysis of the causes in
neoliberalism.
Photo: Portrait of Member of European Parliament Judith Sargentini (Dutch Greens); Source: Persfoto's van GroenLinks Europa, vrij te gebruiken (Groenlinkseuropa)
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Author: Chris HannAugust 22, 2018
The 2018 conference of the European Association of Social Anthropologists was an opportunity for members of the “Realising Eurasia” project to disseminate their research. It also prompted one participant to reflect on continuing regional imbalance within the discipline and on ambivalences when it comes to engaging with contemporary issues of public concern.
Image: Official logo of the European Association of Social Anthropologists (https://www.easaonline.org/).
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Author: Chris HannAugust 3, 2018
One way to construct an enemy, increasingly common in our age, is to allege that he or she has betrayed “X” values. Usually X refers to the values of a nation (-state). In some cases, notably that of Europe, the evocation is transnational, and the deeper aspirations may even be universal (“human rights”). The grander the rhetorical claim, the more likely it is to be saturated in hypocrisy. But the contemporary trivializing of values in everyday media polemics should not blind us to their real significance in world history.
Photos: Some of the personalities discussed in this post - information concerning sources is given at the end.
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Author: Don KalbJune 1, 2018
All at once Karl Marx is everywhere. Conferences the world over are commemorating, discussing, and criticizing his life and work. Respectful editorials and op-eds in the world’s newspapers remind us of the significance of his 200
th birthday, while caustically chipping away at some of his claims. Staunch liberal pundits feel forced to pronounce in stern voice why he was wrong. The
Süddeutsche Zeitung (5 May 2018) summarized it all candidly: he lives.
Photo: Chinese Poster (1972) courtesy of the Hamburger Institut für Sozialforschung (© HIS/Archiv)
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Author: Ivan RajkovićApril 23, 2018
“Work must be our main ideology, the foundation of our faith, our investment in everyone’s future” proclaimed Serbian president. How can we understand the popularity of state campaigns advocating the change of ‘national work ethic’? Are these yet another example of state moralisation of austerity measures? Looking at the status of work in Kragujevac, an industrial town in Serbia, I argue that such campaigns resonate with longstanding working class anxieties around the meaning and value of labour in dilapidated firms – and cannot be reduced to either market hegemony or state policies.
Photo: Protest of Zastava Cars workers who were made redundant (2012).
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Author: Chris Hann March 26, 2018
The recent meeting of China’s National People’s Congress has generated many reflections on that state’s political system and model of economic development. If the “bet” that increasing prosperity would sooner or later lead to something like Western liberal democracy has failed, how should one assess what is unfolding in China today? And in the Russian Federation of Vladimir Putin? And in the Visegrád realm of Viktor Orbán?
Photo: National People’s Congress, Beijing, 2015
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Author: Chris Hann Februar 07, 2018
Drawing on his fieldwork in provincial Hungary (in the framework of the ERC Project REALEURASIA), Chris Hann published an article on the subject of “populism” on 29.12.2017 in the Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung. One month later on 30.01.2018 Hann was sharply criticised in a reader’s letter by Theo Waigel, well known as Germany’s Minister of Finance in the years 1989-1998. In this blogpost Hann responds to the reproaches of Waigel.
Photo: Theodor "Theo" Waigel, German politician (CSU), during the CSU party congress on 19.10.2012 in Munich.
(Photo: Michael Lucan, Lizenz: CC-BY-SA 3.0 de)
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Author: Sylvia TerpeDecember 20, 2017
The works of Max Weber are an important part of the theoretical framework of the REALEURASIA project. Hence we were fortunate that Hans Joas accepted our invitation to give the keynote lecture at our conference in Wittenberg in early December 2017. In his new book,
Die Macht des Heiligen, Joas critiques not only Weber’s concept of disenchantment, but also his ideas of rationalization, differentiation and modernization, all of them basic to sociology’s self-understanding. What does Hans Joas’ critique imply for the study of economy and economic action together with their moral dimensions, the primary concerns of the REALEURASIA project?
Photo: Hans Joas presents parts of his new book,
Die Macht des Heiligen, in Wittenberg (Photo: Stefan Schwendtner)
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Authors: Chris Hann and Lale Yalçın-HeckmannDecember 19, 2017
The project „Realising Eurasia“ completed its third year in summer 2017 and it is time to start outlining results. This post summarizes various conferences and lectures between September and December 2017, to which all team members contributed. These diverse events reflect our various concerns - historical and contemporary, economic, religious and moral. The micro-level detail of the individual ethnographic projects illuminates the big Eurasian and global picture.
Image: Wittenberg conference poster (The photograph shows the stone carving of a Buddha in Mandalay, Myanmar. Photo: Laura Hornig, 2015).
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Author: Lale Yalçın-Heckmann October 11, 2017
I have been making fieldwork visits to the province of Isparta over the last three years, mostly during the summer months when there is an interesting seasonal shift in the population. With its cooler summer temperatures, the region is favoured by many former locals who work in and have migrated to other cities and countries. Isparta residents welcome these returnees every summer, seeing the motivation of summer visitors as local patriotism for and loyalty (
vefa) to their place of origin. Some of Isparta’s towns, such as the centres of administrative districts, which are almost empty in the winter become lively and reminiscent of many other urban holiday resorts of Turkey.
Photo: “
Isparta Hatırası”: This box contains a prayer rug which smells of roses. Returnees often buy such souvenirs from Isparta to give them as gifts to friends and colleagues in other Turkish cities or abroad.
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Author: Chris HannSeptember 18, 2017
Before the collapse of socialism in 1989-1990 the Hungarian economy was one of the most open in the region. Yet international trade was still dominated by COMECON and links to countries outside the Soviet bloc were weak. The radical changes brought by market capitalism have included the pervasive movement of goods and people across the whole of the Eurasian landmass and beyond. The implications of current configurations are explored in this post with reference to a region of southern Hungary which the author has known since the 1970s.
Photo: Mercedes Factory, Kecskemét.
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Author: Matthijs KrulAugust 11, 2017
The occasion of Jack Goody's recent passing was a major event not just within the confines of anthropology, but also for the field of comparative world history. He was, or is, probably as much known for the great intellectual efforts he spent during his career on combating the Eurocentric worldview in the study of world history in the
longue durée as he is for his more anthropologically oriented studies of literacy and the LoDagaa in northern Ghana. Goody played an important part in the rise of a consciously anti-Eurocentric tradition in the former field. A number of his books, such as
The East in the West (1996),
Capitalism and Modernity: The Great Debate (2004),
The Theft of History (2006), and
The Eurasian Miracle (2010), were themselves major events in the development of this tradition.
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Author: Sylvia TerpeJuly 13, 2017
Do owners of small and medium sized firms in Halle feel passionate about their work? Do they feel recognized by politicians and the society? Do they take care of their employees? Would they subordinate other aspects of life to work? First analysis of interviews and questionnaires shows an ambivalent picture: owners feel passionate about their work but hardly recognized.
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Author: Lizhou HaoJuly 13, 2017
Civil society and the public sphere emerge when individuals and groups begin to speak out against their rulers or demand a government response to social needs. To judge whether there is a civil society in the Western sense or a trend towards such a civil society, in China, one needs to identify this public sphere.
Photo: Storefronts of the accessories market on the old street.
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Author: Sudeshna ChakiJuly 12, 2017
On 1 July 2017 India embarked on sweeping reforms of its goods and services tax in what is the largest restructuring of its taxation system since independence. Businesses and consumers in this country with a population of 1.3 billion are preparing for the impact of the new system. However, in spite of much discussion and speculation in the previous months, nobody is yet sure precisely how it will affect the economy – particularly India’s substantial informal sector – once implemented.
Photo: A small scale Notebook manufacturing unit in action. Maharashtra, India.
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Author: Daria TereshinaJuly 12, 2017
The European University at St Petersburg is facing the threat of losing its license. This private university, which has been ranked among the top in Russia, is engaged in a fight with the bureaucratic machine to secure its survival. The distressing fate of the Russian graduate school is not unique in Eastern Europe (the Central European University in Budapest is dealing with similar issues); however, the story is interesting because it reflects some typical patterns and scenarios of state control in present-day Russia. During my field research, my informants – business owners of small firms in the provincial Russian town – also systematically encountered such situations.
Image: The logotype of the European University at St Petersburg; [Source: https://eu.spb.ru/]
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Author: Luca SzücsJuly 12, 2017
‘Family values’ bear particular importance both for the present political course of Hungary and its dominant Catholic Church. All sociological studies of values and attitudes toward family and gender roles place Hungary amongst the most conservative countries, despite the fact that that marriage as an institution has lost its hegemony. Drawing on an example from my research, I show how the decision to become self-employed and rely on one’s family in livelihood strategies is reinforced by religious ideas and family sentiments.
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Author: Anne Erita Venåsen BertaJuly 10, 2017
How do entrepreneurs relate to welfare state regulations? Is the Scandinavian sentiment of fairness visible in the way they relate to taxes and employment? In this blog I will touch upon some of the attitudes and practices I discovered among the owners of small businesses in Denmark.
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Author: Laura HornigJuly 10, 2017
In Myanmar as in many other countries, the majority of the population has no access to any state support. Yet in the management of both everyday economic matters and financial emergencies, many strategies and patterns serve a social support function. In Pathein, Myanmar, a broad concept of social support illuminates a variety of community-level activities outside of the state sphere.
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Author: Chris HannJune 21, 2017
The Workshop “Geographies of Markets”, hosted over three days in mid-June 2017 by the Karl Polanyi Institute of Political Economy at Concordia University, Montréal, gave scholars from a wide range of countries and disciplines an opportunity to assess the continued relevance of the Polanyian critique of “market society”. Even if this critique lacks the formal rigor of neoclassical economics, even if Polanyi’s concept of market exchange fails to capture the institutional intricacies of contemporary markets, and even if the man himself was very much a European intellectual of his age, his approach still appears to provide the best scientific foundation on which to build global political and normative alternatives to neoliberal hegemony. Today, however, his geographic binary between East and West, like his ideal types of redistribution and market exchange, all need careful reappraisal.
Photo: Panorama of downtown Montréal from Mont Royal (Mark Harvey, June 2017).
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Author: Chris HannJune 6, 2017
The finale of Thomas Hylland Eriksen’s “Overheating” project on 1st June 2017 coincided with the announcement in Washington that the US President was withdrawing his country from the Paris climate agreement, to which the previous US administration had signed up in 2015. The rest of the world looks on bewildered and appalled. The prompt joint reaffirmation of the accords by Brussels and Beijing is especially noteworthy; this axis contradicts the geopolitical common sense of recent generations, but it is consistent with the longue durée of Eurasian history.
Image: Trevor Nickolls: Warmun Mandala © Trevor Nickolls/BONO 8 [logo of the Overheating project, permission for use granted by Thomas Hylland Eriksen]
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Authors: Ceren Deniz and Lale Yalçın-HeckmannApril 24, 2017
In a referendum on 16 April 2017, Turks voted by a small majority to adopt an executive presidency system radically different from the republican regime that had been in place since 1923. The ‘yes’ and ‘no’ campaigns were carried out under the state of emergency imposed since 15 July 2016 following an attempted coup. The results of the referendum show that the three largest metropoles (Istanbul, Ankara and Izmir) voted No, as did the more developed coastal regions, but also less developed provinces in south-east Anatolia populated mainly by Kurds. The provinces of Çorum and Isparta where Ceren Deniz and Lale Yalçın-Heckmann carry out their REALEURASIA projects belong to the ‘yes’ bloc.
Image: Map of Turkey – Referendum results according to province (red = No, blue = Yes); [Source: http://referandum.ntv.com.tr/]
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Author: Chris HannMarch 13, 2017
Sixty this month, the European Union is almost as old as me. Should we, in March 2017, celebrate a beacon of liberal-democratic sanity between the populists of Washington and London to the West and those of Ankara and Moscow to the East? Or is it time to pension off the construction launched with the Treaty of Rome in 1957, since it has come to violate basic desiderata of economic efficiency and equity as well as democratic legitimacy?
[Image (cropped): http://ec.europa.eu/avservices/images/60_Rome.png]
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Author: Lizhou HaoJanuary 12, 2017
In small cities like Shishi, urban and rural areas merge seamlessly. In city centre streets as in village lanes, family temples in typical Chinese architectural style catch the eye with their glazed tiles shimmering in the sunlight. Building and renovating family temples has become a craze throughout the Minnan region as the economy has prospered. Why do wealthy locals re-embrace traditional culture? How do they raise money for temple construction, how are temples managed, and what are their multiple functions in people’s daily lives?
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Author: Sudeshna ChakiJanuary 4, 2017
What happens when a predominantly cash based economy scraps two of its most widely circulated notes overnight? In this short analysis of India’s recent demonetization I offer some insight into a topic which is likely to have a big effect on people’s morality and livelihoods - both immediately and in the long run.
Photo: The newly introduced ₹2000 note. (indiaexpress.com)
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Author: Luca SzücsJanuary 3, 2017
Who controls the shop? This question is crucial for work discipline. Granting employees a sphere of autonomy and encouraging them to identify with their boss’s interests fosters job satisfaction and ultimately enhances labour discipline.
Photo: A National Tobacco Shop in Szeged (Photo: Luca Szücs, July 2016).
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Author: Daria TereshinaJanuary 2, 2017
In the course of my fieldwork in Smolensk I was often told that family enterprises were characteristic of other, non-Russian ethnic traditions. Yet the vast majority of my interlocutors among ethnically Russian small business owners regularly turn to their relatives for assistance. What are the moral sentiments that shape family capitalism in post-Soviet Russia?
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Author: Ceren DenizDecember 21, 2016
What makes an ordinary guy work in a family business which he feels familiar with but cannot adapt to even after two years? I use the example of Osman to initiate a discussion about the social organization of the workplace and specifically the dynamics of employing family members.
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Author: Laura HornigDecember 16, 2016
The most important religious event in the childhood of most male Burmese is their novitation ceremony. While the child acts as a provider of religious merit for his parents, the ceremony at the same time constitutes an economic burden for many families. Through combining the effort with other members of the neighborhood this burden can be lessened and community ties can be strengthened.
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Author: Chris HannNovember 23, 2016
The 115th annual meeting of the American Anthropological Association in Minneapolis was overshadowed by the election in the previous week of Donald Trump as the 45th President of the USA. I was there to participate in a series of meetings to salute the work of Stephen Gudeman of the University of Minnesota, who has recently retired. Many presentations focused on the well-known Gudemanian oppositions between the house economy and the corporation, between the values of the base and those of the market, and, by analogy, between the Obama White House and Trump Tower. The ethnographic and theoretical work of Steve Gudeman has had a huge impact on economic anthropology and is highly pertinent to the choices facing humanity in the anthropocene.
Photo: Trump Tower
(Photo: Ingfbruno; License Category: CC-BY-SA-3.0)
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Author: Anne Erita Venåsen Berta
October 12, 2016
In 1984, Norwegian anthropologist Marianne Gullestad published a theory of Scandinavian equality which sparked a debate resulting in decades of continuous publications by various contributors concerning
the Scandinavian obsession with equality. Here, I will discuss these ideas of equality and sameness in the light of Danish family firms and the owners’ role as equal.
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Author: Chris HannOctober 4, 2016
On 2nd October 2016 Hungarians were invited by their government to express an opinion about the European Union’s proposal to distribute migrants among its member states according to quotas. Following a propaganda campaign reminiscent of the 1950s, voters chose overwhelmingly to follow the advice of their Prime Minister Viktor Orbán. However, the majority of those eligible chose not to vote at all, thus rendering this referendum invalid. Viktor claimed victory but he was left with egg on his face. This Hungarian instance raises more general questions about referenda: when are they the wise and necessary instruments of a democratic civil society and when do they become tools for abuse, by office-holders and others?
Photo: Referendum posters in the village of Harkakötöny: “Did you know that almost a million immigrants want to come to Europe from Libya alone?” (by Chris Hann)
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Author: Ceren DenizAugust 19, 2016
None of last year’s political developments in Turkey have disturbed the rhythm of regular work life. Ordinary life has kept its daily rhythm; the workday routine was not interrupted. It was only in the month of Ramadan in June that I realized some business owners were planning to make changes in the organization of the working day, according to what they think is more suitable to the fasting hours. In this short blog, I want to set aside the extraordinary political situation in Turkey and focus on irregular work arrangements and time apprehension specific to Ramadan every year.
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Author: Lizhou HaoAugust 19, 2016
A recent study on Days Sales Outstanding (DSO) by Euler Hermes shows that in 2016 firms in China have to wait on average 92 days to get paid. It is as much as 134 days in the machinery and equipment industry. This is the longest time worldwide. The Chinese media have picked up on this as a news item, but in my field site, Shishi, the habit of delaying payment stretches back decades.
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Author: Daria TereshinaAugust 19, 2016
As a PhD student of REALEURASIA project I am currently spending a period of one year doing fieldwork in Smolensk, Russia. In this blog post I introduce my early observations concerning family-based enterprises. To unpack the emic perceptions of family businesses I outline the range of moral sentiments as well as material conditions that shape the interplay of family and work in provincial Russia in 21st century.
Photo: Production workshop for signboards (by Daria Tereshina).
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Author: Sudeshna ChakiAugust 15, 2016
Family and business are often perceived as involving different set of values. Are family businesses the arena where these values contest and overlap? Tracing the history of a family owned firm, where partners are also family members, this blog post attempts to uncover the array of familial sentiments, morals and values that drive the long term evolution of firm and its strategies.
Photo: A rusty welcome to an industrial area in the town (by Sudeshna Chaki).
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Author: Chris HannJuly 21, 2016
This is a commentary on the current crisis in Turkey by a social anthropologist who did field research on the Black Sea coast in the last century and who has retained his interest to the present day. Following the failed putsch on 15 July 2016, the great majority of Western commentaries have been quick to warn the authorities against an excessive backlash. President Erdoğan is condemned and ridiculed for his authoritarian inclinations. Some commentators draw the conclusion that Turkey has demonstrated definitively that it is “unfit for Europe”. This post argues for a very different stance towards this pivotal Eurasian state.
Photo: Statue of Mustafa Kemal (Atatürk) in Rize, Black Sea coast (by Chris Hann).
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Author: Laura HornigJuly 21, 2016
As part of REALEURASIA I am conducting a year of field research in Pathein, Myanmar. This blog post presents some early ethnographic findings. It addresses the struggles that small craft businesses face in the course of Myanmar’s recent economic developments and their strategies.
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Author: Luca SzücsJuly 21, 2016
“What makes people work?” This ostensibly simple question was raised by Olivia Harris (2007) in her nuanced ethnography of the cooperative labour of Andean peasant communities. Going beyond materialist answers, she argues for a holistic approach to the comprehension of work, including the broader understanding of value under various historical, political and cultural circumstances. I kept the complexity of Harris’s question constantly in mind during my participant observation in two National Tobacco Shops.
Photo: Cigarettes for sale in a state monopoly shop, Szeged, Hungary (by Luca Szücs).
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Author: Sylvia TerpeJuly 6, 2016
When our PhD-students in the REALEURASIA-project left Halle, the home location of our institute, in late summer 2015, I felt a small sting of envy. While they (as anthropologists) would go to distant places and feel the excitement of the new, I (as the sociologist in the project) would stay in Halle, a city in the middle of East Germany on the river Saale - which is at the same time my home town. However, doing fieldwork on one’s doorstep has its own fascination...
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Author: Chris Hann July 4, 2016
"Jack often reminded me that, until the 16th century, China was by far the most advanced in many domains before entering a decline that lasted until the 20th century, but that, from the standpoint of the overall history of Humankind, this in no way authorizes the conclusion that there might exist a definitive split between the East and the West. The history of the past twenty years has proved him right. Increasingly we are seeing societies, like China and India, declare their intention to continue to modernize but without becoming Westernized. In an effort to combat this Western self-deception, Jack was intent on showing what we share with the East since the Bronze Age, when we were all part of what he called Eurasia."
Maurice Godelier, June 2016
Left: Portrait of Sir Jack Goody by Maggi Hambling; reproduced with permission of St John's College, Cambridge
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Author: Chris Hann June 6, 2016
Ahead of the British referendum on continued EU membership (“Brexit”) on 23
rd June, I am regularly asked how I intend to vote. The answer is not easy. Emotionally I identify primarily with the country where I was born and brought up, Wales. Intellectually, for many years I have questioned all constructions of Europe as a continent. I emphasize instead the long-term unity of the entire Eurasian landmass, and the need in contemporary politics to build on this heritage. Tensions between two intermediate levels of government therefore do not engage me deeply. Currently, neither set of power holders (London or Brussels) inspires much confidence in its integrity, let alone sympathy for a vision of the future. But there is always the principle of the lesser evil …
[Postscriptum, on the day of the result]
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Author: Lale Yalçın-HeckmannMay 6, 2016
The time of the roses and rose harvest in the province of Isparta in Turkey is approaching. Since the last winter was rather mild, some villages have already started the harvest, I was recently told. Isparta, a province in south western Turkey has been known for its oil bearing rose ‘
Rosa Damascena’ for over a century. This rose is cultivated primarily for its oil, which is used in cosmetic, perfume, food, medicine and health industries.
Photo: The monument for Ismail Efendi at Isparta’s central square (by Lale Yalçın-Heckmann)
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Author: Chris HannMay 4, 2016
The Transatlantic Trade and Investment Partnership proposes to solidify a boundary between Western Eurasia and the rest of the landmass and is already a major political issue of the last year of Barack Obama’s Presidency. TTIP is best understood as an attempt to sustain capitalism in its Western heartlands, where it has been in serious trouble for decades. Critics mostly point to its disregard for consumer standards and planetary environments. Here it is argued that the EU would do better to forge new partnerships with dynamic civilizations elsewhere in Eurasia. The problem of contemporary “Atlantic civilization” (Mauss) is fundamentally the same as that which instigated two World Wars in the last century, an “obsolete market mentality” (Polanyi). Critical inspiration for a comparison of Mauss and Polanyi is drawn from a new English translation of the former’s “The Gift”, and in particular from a launch event on 30th April 2016 at the University of London.
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Author: Ceren DenizApril 27, 2016
If state investments, raw materials and marketing routes were so scarce, then how did Çorum people start businesses, make good trade deals and begin to export manufactures in the last decades?
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Author: Sudeshna ChakiApril 22, 2016
Well connected by railways to the famous metropolis of Bombay (population 18 million), Palghar is a small town lying close to the western coastline of India. The town is growing at an impressive pace yet its streets are dotted by petty traders, rickshaws and temples of varying significance. A burgeoning industrial area, new roads, overcrowded buses, an ethnically diverse population and intense heat – all characterise this snapshot of a quintessential Indian urban area. This post is a short presentation of what I have found so far.
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Author: Lizhou HaoApril 19, 2016
Which place can represent China best: the metropolis Beijing or the poor rural areas in the West? This question may sound boring for students of Chinese Studies, because a part can hardly represent the whole. Yet this question addresses the important issue of how to avoid one-sided observations in face of China's huge urban-rural differences. Fortunately, to some extent my field site covers both sides.
Photo: The ancestral temple of the Cai Family in Shishi (by Lizhou Hao).
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Author: Daria TereshinaApril 18, 2016
The city where I have been doing fieldwork for the last six months has a rich history as “a shield of Russia,” a phrase referring to its role in various wars (particularly the war against Napoleon in 1812 and the Second World War). Located in Russia’s Western borderlands, Smolensk has been influenced by different religious traditions. In the postsocialist decades the city's Orthodox heritage has been emphatically stressed. My research aims to uncover the influence of Orthodox Christian teachings on the economic behaviour of contemporary small businesses, the main focus of the REALEURASIA project.
Photo: The Dormition Cathedral at the Dnepr river (by Daria Tereshina).
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Author: Luca SzücsApril 14, 2016
Roman Catholicism is the dominant faith in the Hungarian city of Szeged, where the grandiose cathedral was constructed in the late Habsburg era following the Great Flood of 1879. However, as I am discovering in my field research, it is by no means clear what influence (if any) religious affiliation has on the economic strategies of small businesses in the postsocialist era.
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Author: Anne Erita Venåsen BertaApril 12, 2016
The Scandinavian field site of the REALEURASIA project is a middle-sized city. This region of northern Europe has few big cities, and the one in which I have spent the past six months does not have such a feel, though in fact it is one of the country’s largest in terms of both population and geography.
In this blog post, I will give a brief introduction to the early stages of fieldwork and some reflections on what a family firm is, based on six months of fieldwork in mainly one family firm.
Photo: Lutheran church in a working-class urban suburb (by Ildikó Bellér-Hann).
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Author: Laura HornigApril 11, 2016
As part of the REALEURASIA project, my research aims to explore links between religion and economic ethics in small businesses in Myanmar. With its strong Buddhist tradition and the rapid changes in politics and economy that the country is going through currently, Myanmar is a particular exciting location for anthropological research. With the first months of field work behind me, I want to share some impressions and thoughts on this blog.
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Author: Chris HannMarch 16, 2016
Regional elections in Germany have seldom if ever attracted as much attention as they did on Sunday 13th March, 2016. This was the first opportunity for the electorate to express its opinion about the “refugee policy” pursued by Chancellor Angela Merkel since early September 2015. Not only her own Christian Democratic Union but also the Social Democrats, her coalition partner in Berlin, lost votes to a new protest party, the Alternative for Germany. These “Rechtspopulisten” did especially well in Saxony-Anhalt, where I live. Rather than simply join the chorus of condemnation of this vile movement and celebrate the humanitarian altruism shown by the mainstream parties towards deserving foreigners, it behooves social scientists to analyze the deeper causes and consequences of both the voting and the migration patterns.
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Author: Chris HannMarch 7, 2016
Cuba has been a Caribbean outpost of Eurasia in two quite different senses: the life of the Hispanic colony came to an end in 1898, but the Marxist-Leninist Revolution survives, at least for the time being. Ahead of President Obama’s visit (to be followed by the Rolling Stones and a crucial Congress of the ruling Party), locals as well as foreigners believe that the largest island of the region has reached a turning point. An academic workshop interrogating the concept of scale, co-hosted by a Havana Research Institute, together with observations and conversations outside the formal sessions, provided this first-time visitor with a wealth of materials to reflect not just on the current situation in Cuba but on the past and future of Eurasian socialism.
Photo: Havana skyline from across the harbour at Regla (by Chris Hann).
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Author: Matthijs KrulJanuary 18, 2016
The death of Douglass North, who won the Nobel Prize for economics in 1993 for his work on developing the New Institutionalist Economic History (NIEH), will certainly be felt in all disciplines associated with economic research. Even if North failed ultimately to meet the challenge of Polanyi, it is striking to observe how over the course of his long career, his project of ‘successive endogenization’ forced him into a degree engagement with economic anthropological topics almost unheard of among economic historians. One may even observe a certain convergence with Polanyi’s own positions, in particular in the emphasis on historical specificity, nonmarket forms of allocation, and the economy as an instituted process.
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Author: Matthijs KrulOctober 26, 2015
To borrow a classic phrase from the Maoist tradition, our REALEurasia project ‘walks on two legs’. As part of our efforts to contribute to the unfinished project of comparative historical economic anthropology in Eurasia (Hann 2015), the doctoral students undertake detailed anthropological fieldwork across a number of civilisationally representative sites. However, we also consider the bigger picture and the longer term. As part of my postdoctoral work, and building on my interests in different conceptualisations of global history, I had the opportunity to organize a workshop on a larger historiographical question.
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Author: Chris Hann October 8, 2015
Two recent conference invitations (“European Narratives” in Cracow, 24-26 September, and “Where is the Border of the West?”, Przemyśl-Lviv, 2-4 October) led me to draw up an inventory of some of the east-west binaries I have known in my life – and to reflect on the ways in which borders are being imagined and implemented in western Eurasia in the summer of 2015. The current finger-wagging of western politicians and academics towards the Visegrad Group reinforces hackneyed stereotypes of eastern Europe but does not advance understanding or explanations of the deeper causes of the current “migrant crisis”.
Photo: The church of the Carmelite (Roman Catholic) order in Przemyśl, formerly the cathedral of the Greek Catholic Church.
(Photo: Goku 122; License: Creative Commons CC BY-SA 4.0)
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Author: Chris Hann
September 7, 2015
I spent the last weeks of August and the first days of September in Hungary, close to the European Union’s border with Serbia. Never before had a routine field trip catapulted me into an engagement with issues dominating daily headlines, both in Hungary and elsewhere. What light can social anthropology throw on the current “migrant crisis”?
Photo: The transit zone at Budapest's Keleti Station (by Chris Hann).
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Author: Chris Hann
July 21, 2015
The Workshop to mark the end of the first year of our “Realising Eurasia” project was overshadowed by the passing of Jack Goody, one of the main sources of inspiration for this research, and for many other initiatives in the department “Resilience and Transformation in Eurasia”.
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Author: Chris Hann
June 15, 2015
Bronislaw Malinowski (to his intimates Bronio), founder of the modern British School of social anthropology, is justly admired for the results of his fieldwork on the Trobriand Islands during the First World War. But the economic component of this ethnography has long been a puzzle, vitiated by polemics against “economic man” which are not substantiated in a coherent theoretical approach. Perhaps the inconsistencies can be traced back to his use of the concept of
ekonomia in his doctoral dissertation in philosophy, submitted in 1906 at the Jagiellonian University in Cracow. In June 2015, an invitation to lecture at this university gave me the opportunity to examine this possibility more closely.
Photo Source: Bronislaw Malinowski, c1930; Author: Library of the London School of Economics and Political Science.
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Author: Chris HannMay 27, 2015
I was encouraged by some members of the „Realising Eurasia“ project to write a blog commenting on the results of the general election in Britain earlier this month. But I thought it would be more instructive – and more fun – to wait for the 60th staging of the Eurovision Song Contest.
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Author: Chris HannApril 30, 2015
Karl Polanyi (1886–1964), the seminal figure of economic anthropology, is nowadays a source of inspiration throughout the social sciences. For some years I have been trying to apply his critique of market society to the regions of Central Europe where he was raised, in particular Hungary. What follows is based on my contribution to an event organized on 23rd April 2015 by the recently established Karl Polanyi Research Center of Global Social Studies at the Corvinus University of Budapest.
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Author: Lale Yalçın-HeckmannApril 17, 2015
These days Manchester may be better known for its Premier League clubs: United and City’s superstar players are among the most highly prized commodities in the neoliberal world of today’s global football industry.
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Author: Chris HannMarch 23, 2015
Inaugurating the REALEURASIA pantheon No, not really, I am not Aristotle, and my French is not much better than my Greek. I have merely borrowed an idiom that became known world-wide following violent events in France in January 2015.
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Author: Chris HannDecember 3, 2014
Shostakovich in Händel’s home townHalle has been my home town for the last 15 years. It is a small city close to Leipzig in the former German Democratic Republic. You are more likely to overhear conversations in Russian and Ukrainian in the trams hereabouts than in other parts of Germany.
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Author: Chris HannSeptember 26, 2014
The North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO) summit in South Wales held 4–5 September 2014 was heavily mediatized in member countries as a “wake-up call” for this military alliance, for Europe, and even for Western civilization.
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