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The Impact of Money on an African Subsistence Economy

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  • Bohannan, Paul

Abstract

It has often been claimed that money was to be found in much of the African continent before the impact of the European world and the extension of trade made coinage general. When we examine these claims, however, they tend to evaporate or to emerge as tricks of definition. It is an astounding fact that economists have, for decades, been assigning three or four qualities to money when they discuss it with reference to our own society or to those of the medieval and modern world, yet the moment they have gone to ancient history or to the societies and economies studied by anthropologists they have sought the “real” nature of money by allowing only one of these defining characteristics to dominate their definitions.

Suggested Citation

  • Bohannan, Paul, 1959. "The Impact of Money on an African Subsistence Economy," The Journal of Economic History, Cambridge University Press, vol. 19(4), pages 491-503, December.
    • Handle: RePEc:cup:jechis:v:19:y:1959:i:04:p:491-503_08
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    Cited by:

    1. Robert M. Rosenswig, 2024. "Understanding money; Or, why social and financial accounting should not be conflated," Economic Anthropology, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 11(1), pages 71-86, January.
    2. Chan, May & Kemp, Simon & Finsterwalder, Jörg, 2016. "The concept of near money in loyalty programmes," Journal of Retailing and Consumer Services, Elsevier, vol. 31(C), pages 246-255.
    3. Jérôme Blanc, 2017. "Unpacking monetary complementarity and competition: a conceptual framework," Cambridge Journal of Economics, Cambridge Political Economy Society, vol. 41(1), pages 239-257.
    4. Albert Schrauwers, 2022. "Banknotes, bookkeeping barter, and cloth money: Conversions of “special‐purpose money” in the cloth and dammar trade of Sulawesi, Indonesia, 1860–1905," Economic Anthropology, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 9(1), pages 8-21, January.
    5. Melitz, Jacques, 1970. "The Polanyi School of Anthropology on Money: An Economist's View," MPRA Paper 84893, University Library of Munich, Germany, revised 1970.
    6. Ehsan Lor Afshar, 2022. "Banking the Bazl: Building a future in a sanctioned economy," Economic Anthropology, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 9(1), pages 60-71, January.
    7. Jacqueline S. Solway, 1994. "Drought as a Revelatory Crisis: An Exploration of Shifting Entitlements and Hierarchies in the Kalahari, Botswana," Development and Change, International Institute of Social Studies, vol. 25(3), pages 471-495, July.
    8. Martin Tremčinský, 2022. "Bitcoin and its spheres of consumption: Transactional orders of consuming money in the Czech and Slovak Bitcoin community," Economic Anthropology, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 9(1), pages 35-46, January.
    9. Hadrien Saiag, 2014. "Towards a neo-Polanyian approach to money: integrating the concept of debt," Post-Print halshs-02343433, HAL.
    10. Cieslik, Katarzyna, 2016. "Moral Economy Meets Social Enterprise Community-Based Green Energy Project in Rural Burundi," World Development, Elsevier, vol. 83(C), pages 12-26.
    11. Théo Bourgeron, 2018. "Optimising ‘cash flows’: converting corporate finance to hard currency," Post-Print hal-03165942, HAL.
    12. Ermolin, Ilya (Ермолин, Илья), 2015. "Communal Self-Regulation of “Informal” Economy: Evidences from Northern Dagestan in Russia [Процессы Коммунального Саморегулирования «Неформальной» Экономики]," Ekonomicheskaya Politika / Economic Policy, Russian Presidential Academy of National Economy and Public Administration, vol. 1, pages 159-176, February.
    13. Matteo Aria & Nicolò Bellanca, 2012. "The Polytheistic Condition: Incomparable Assets and Special Currency," Working Papers - Economics wp2012_20.rdf, Universita' degli Studi di Firenze, Dipartimento di Scienze per l'Economia e l'Impresa.
    14. Keith Hart, 2012. "Money in Twentieth-century Anthropology," Chapters, in: James G. Carrier (ed.), A Handbook of Economic Anthropology, Second Edition, chapter 10, Edward Elgar Publishing.

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