Journal of Business Anthropology

The Editor's Two Cents

Greg Urban — 2019-04-29

The Editor's Two Cents

Conflicting Interpretations: On Analyzing An Agribusiness’ Concerns About Critique

Tijo Salverda — 2019-04-29

This article explores different ways to interpret the extent to which (capitalist) critique influences corporate practice. Starting from (self-) reflection upon negotiations between the author and a European company involved in land-based investment in Zambia, this contribution shows that corporate actors may be more responsive to their critics, such as NGOs, journalists, local communities, and (activist) scholars, than often assumed. It may be argued that anthropology partly misses this dynamic, due to its limited interest in ethnographic engagement with the powerful and its critical interpretations of capitalism. At the same time, with persistent unequal corporate advantages and wrongdoing, critical interpretations remain of significant relevance to understanding the limits of corporate responses. Reflecting on the balance between these different interpretations, the article aims to discuss the intricacies of analyzing and critiquing corporate practices.

Business Anthropology Fieldwork Problems in the 21st Century

Bill Beeman — 2019-04-29

Comment on Salverda:

Business Anthropology Fieldwork Problems in the 21^st Century

To Critique or not to Critique? That is (perhaps not) the Question…

Hannah Appel — 2019-04-29

Comment on Salverda:

To Critique or not to Critique? That is (perhaps not) the Question…

Between Access and Critique

Tijo Salverda — 2019-04-29

Response to Beeman & Appel:

Between Access and Critique

His Master’s Voice? Conceptualizing the Relationship Between Business and the World Economic Forum

Christina Garsten — 2019-04-29

Commonly, the relationship between corporations and non-for profit organizations, such as foundations, think tanks and private research institutes, is analyzed in terms suggesting that when acting as funders corporations set the frames for the non-for profit organization who, in turn, not only mimics but also serves as to broadcast the views of its funder. Drawing on the case of the Swizz based foundation/think tank World Economic Forum and its corporate funders we scrutinize this relationship. We show that as an organization interested in global policy making it is of vital importance for the Forum to construct its own agency, not merely giving voice to its funder’s views, and that it will do so drawing on the resources that the funders provide. Moreover, we submit that as organizations all partaking actors will endeavor to construct their own agency, oftentimes by drawing on the resources of others. In so doing, actors may have both overlapping and divergent interests. Evoking the Lévi-Strauss concept of the bricoleur, we analyze how the various and multifaceted priorities of corporations will not only be filtered by the Form, but it will also make use of the resources at hand for organizing forth own policy messages. The result is a complex and dynamic web of actors and voices.

Unfair Trade: Protectionism, Protests and the Pursuit of Free Trade in New Zealand

Sasha Maher — 2019-04-29

Is free trade dead? In January 2017, President Trump withdrew the United States from the controversial Trans-Pacific Partnership free trade agreement (TPP). This paper examines some of the anthropological implications of what emerged out of the “death” of the TPP. It analyses what this reveals about the changing contours of the neoliberal state, business-government relations and the subjectivity of corporate leaders. More broadly, it seeks to explain the tenacity of free trade and what is at stake in pursuing free trade agreements such as the TPP. Drawing on fieldwork among state and business elites in New Zealand, the paper suggests that rather than rethink its policy direction, the state deployed discursive strategies and elicited the help of business to reposition free trade as the solution, not the cause that eventually “killed” the TPP. Thus, rather than undermine neoliberalism, the demise of the TPP opened the possibility of its advancement.

The Future Airport – Experiments and Innovative Technologies

Helene Ilkjær — 2019-04-29

Zooming in on the micro-processes involved in developing and user testing new technologies for airports, this article works with the notion of experiments as a way to understand iterative practices and future (re)orientations. In doing so, I aim to think through experiences and experiments with applied anthropology and corporate ethnography within a dialogic framework of 1) current airport industry efforts of re-visioning stakeholder collaboration and airport re-branding and 2) the attempts of a Danish start-up company to create market disruption through innovative technology development. Although the experiments take place at different scales and are performed in different ways, I contend that they must be considered within a common frame in order to tease out their interconnectedness, particularly with regards to experimental confines and motivations. Based on some relatively raw case material, this article unfolds the different layers of experiments and the underlying assumptions that they make apparent.

Short-term Anthropology: Thoughts from a Fieldwork Among Plumbers, Digitalisation, Cultural Assumptions and Marketing Strategies

Mette Marie Vad Karsten — 2019-04-29

Long-term fieldwork and the methodology that goes with it have long set the golden standard for anthropological practice. Quick deadlines, relevance for economic growth, and bigger commercial market shares rarely equal solid anthropology. However, conditions like these are more often than not daily reality for many anthropologists working in the private and public sectors. Through an ethnographic case report this article emphasises the ability to scale up and down anthropological research methodologies and analytic tools used when performing “short-term anthropology.” It will be argued that short project deadlines within days or weeks, specific objectives, and commercial settings do not exclude anthropological practices. On the contrary, such conditions and the requirements involved encourage methodological adjustments and specificity.

Why Businesses and Consumers Need Us

Elisabeth Powell — 2019-04-29

Millennial & Post-millennial Perspectives

Why Businesses and Consumers Need Us