Indians, Markets, and Rainforests : : Theoretical, Comparative, and Quantitative Explorations in the Neotropics / / Ricardo Godoy.

• Superior document: Title is part of eBook package: De Gruyter Columbia University Press eBook-Package Backlist 2000-2013
• VerfasserIn: Godoy, Ricardo,
• Place / Publishing House: New York, NY : : Columbia University Press, , [2001]; ©2001
• Year of Publication: 2001
• Language: English
• Physical Description: 1 online resource (352 p.)

This book addresses two important and related questions: does participation in a market economy help or hurt indigenous peoples and how does it affect the conservation of tropical rainforest flora and fauna? Oddly, there have been few quantitative studies that have addressed these issues.Ricardo Godoy's research takes an important step toward rectifying this oversight by investigating five different lowland Amerindian societies of tropical Latin America-all of which are experiencing deep changes as they modernize. Godoy examines the effect of markets on a broad range of areas including health, conservation of flora and fauna, leisure, folk knowledge, reciprocity, and private time preference. He concludes that, contrary to considerable anthropological theory, the effect of markets on the quality of life and the rainforest are often unclear or benign. Godoy uses multivariate techniques to examine the changes modernization has had on many indicators of the quality of life and the environment and concludes that the seeds of socioeconomic differentiation may already lie dormant in simple economies.The impact of modernization on lowland Amerindians is a topic of great concern to anthropologists, researchers, and policymakers in developing nations, and this book is a significant contribution to the debate about the likely future of indigenous people.

Table of Contents

Frontmatter -- Contents -- Introduction -- Acknowledgments -- Part I. THE QUESTION, THE RESEARCH DESIGN, AND THE PEOPLE -- Chapter 1. The Question and Its Significance -- Chapter 2. Comparing Approaches -- Chapter 3. Research Design -- Chapter 4. Ethnographic Sketches -- Part II. THE FINDINGS -- Chapter 5. Forest Clearance: Income, Technology, and Private Time Preference -- Chapter 6. Game Consumption, Income, and Prices: Empirical Estimates and Implications for Conservation -- Chapter 7. Chayanov and Netting: When Does Demography Matter? -- Chapter 8. Chayanov and Sahlins on Work and Leisure -- Chapter 9. Human Health: Does It Worsen with Markets? -- Chapter 10. Mishaps, Savings, and Reciprocity -- Chapter 11. Trade and Cognition: On the Growth and Loss of Knowledge -- Chapter 12. Time Preference, Markets, and the Evolution of Social Inequality -- Part III. WHAT WE HAVE LEARNED -- Chapter 13. CONCLUSIONS -- Appendix: Test of Folk Knowledge -- References -- Index