From Land to Mouth: The Agricultural "Economy" of the Wola of the New Guinea Highlands (Yale Agrarian Studies Series)

Among the Wola people of Papua New Guinea, our category economy is problematic. Distribution is unnecessary; the producers of everyday needs are the consumers: produce goes largely “from land to mouth” – with no implication that resources are scarce. Yet transactions featuring valuable things -- which are scarce -- are a prominent aspect of life, where sociopolitical exchange figures prominently. The relationship –- or rather the disconnection –- between these two domains is central to understanding the fiercely egalitarian political-economy. In this detailed investigation of a Highland New Guinea agricultural ‘economy’ and acephalous political order—the most thorough inquiry into such a tropical subsistence farming system ever undertaken—esteemed anthropologist Paul Sillitoe interrogates the relevance of key economic ideas in noncapitalist contexts and challenges anthropological shibboleths such as the “gift.” Furthermore, he makes a reactionary-cum-innovative contribution to research methods and analysis, drawing on advances in information technology to manage large data sets. Over a span of more than three decades, Sillitoe has compiled a huge body of ethnography, gaining unprecedented insights into Highlands’ social, economic, and agricultural arrangements. He uses these here to illuminate economic thought in nonmarket contexts, advancing an integrated set of principles underpinning a stateless-subsistence order comparable to that of economists for the state-market. Sillitoe’s insights have implications for economic development programs in regions where capitalist assumptions have limited relevance, following his advocacy of development interventions more respectful of existing social orders. "Among the Wola people in the Highlands region of Papua New Guinea, such concepts as capitalism and market state were, and in many senses continue to be, alien. For these people, distribution is unnecessary; the producers of everyday requirements are the consumers: garden produce goes largely "from land to mouth," which is not to imply resources are scarce. Yet transactions, patently nonmarket, featuring valuable material things--which are scarce--are a prominent aspect of life. The relationship--or rather the disconnection--between these two domains is central to understanding the fiercely egalitarian political economy. In this detailed investigation of a Highland New Guinea agricultural "economy" and acephalous political order where sociopolitical exchange figures prominently--constituting the most thorough inquiry into such a tropical subsistence farming system ever undertaken--esteemed anthropologist Paul Sillitoe challenges assumptions about the universal relevance of key economic ideas in noncapitalist contexts and anthropological shibboleths such as the "gift." Furthermore, he makes a reactionary-cum-innovative contribution to ethnographic research methods and analysis, notably in the use of advances in information technology to manage large data sets. Front Cover From Land to Mouth: The Agricultural "Economy" of the Wola of the New Guinea Highlands Copyright Page Contents List of Illustrations Preface CHAPTER 1 The Agricultural "Economy" CHAPTER 2 Economics and the Self-Interested Individual CHAPTER 3 Community and the Other-Interested Individual CHAPTER 4 Land Tenure and the Collective-Interests Individual CHAPTER 5 Selection of Cultivation Sites and Individual Choice CHAPTER 6 The Land Issue: Scarce Resource? CHAPTER 7 The Population Issue: Too Many People? CHAPTER 8 Pioneering Gardens: Men's Labor CHAPTER 9 Cultivating Gardens: Women's Labor CHAPTER 10 The Labor Question: Scarcity of Time? CHAPTER 11 Exchange: Taro Gardens CHAPTER 12 The Exchange Economy? CHAPTER 13 No Economy, No Development? Appendices 1–3 Notes References Index Over a span of more than three decades, Sillitoe has compiled a huge body of ethnography on the Wola people while gaining deep familiarity with their social, economic, and agricultural systems. Building on this research, he sheds new light on economic thought in noncapitalist contexts and advances for the first time an integrated set of principles underpinning a stateless subsistence order comparable to that advanced by Western philosophy for a state market context. Sillitoe's new economic insights have important implications for development programs in regions where the capitalist category has limited relevance, in line with his work advocating the design of development programs in ways more respectful of the existing social order. "--Book jacket. Paul Sillitoe offers a comparison of the apparently incomparable: our capitalistic economy with the subsistence-cum-exchange order of the Wola people in the Was Valley.