maussian things

Concerning gift economy, MAUSS, etc. First, there is someone called Mathias Studer who just did a mémoire de licence in economy in that perspective... on Linux. I can ask him if he could participate. There is also Francoise Bloch, who has worked for years in the MAUSS and feminist perspectives who lives in Geneva and who would probably participate (or at least come to the discussion) if you could define a bit more the problematic. She is now actually critical of Godbout and the MAUSS, who she finds a bit "angelic". (Like she says, the poor and the women have always been in gift exchange - even if people try now to persuade them to stop. The problem is the growing privileged classes (and all those who identify with them) who aren't into that at all. (She is now researching to try and find figures on how much these bastards are really "earning".) And, I would add, the fact that the ruling class doesn't seem to want to leave any spaces in which (self)excluded people could organise : be it Linux, LETS or subsistence economies of indigenous populations. (For good reasons) they have never been very tolerant of other social projects. And this would be a bad time for them to change, wouldn't it? For example, the french government just decided to abolish the small garanteed income (RMI) that existed. Now to get the same tiny revenue, people will have to work for the State and even for private persons. The days of cheap domestics and forced labor will return, if we can't organise mainstream society to stop them. Anyhow, she gave me a few ideas of people that you could try and look up in Paris or see if they are included somewhere in the FSE encyclopedia-supermarket of discussions. Bernard Laville, Bernard Eme or of course Caillé for MAUSS. There is also Serge Latouche who is an anti-developmentalist influenced by MAUSS ideas. Apart from that (if you have time to read) Francoise is very enthusiastic about Nicanor Perlas, a philipino who has written "La société civile: le 3e pouvoir" (also in english). And a pretty heavy philosopher called Marc Henaff "Le prix de la vérité" on Intellectual property.