Research
As an economic anthropologist, I examine the cultural and political history of the corporation. I analyze this relatively new form of social organization through the lens of colonial historiography, governmentality, and development theory in two distinct locales.
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In the Ontario case, I have written extensively on the corporate origins of early Canada’s transition to a capitalist economy. In particular, I have contrasted the economic vehicles created by groups of utopian socialists (the “Children of Peace”) to meet public needs, with the chartered corporations created by “gentlemanly capitalists” as a way of governing the economy. Theories of governmentality and social capital are melded with political economy to provide an alternate interpretation of the emergence of Canada’s democratic traditions. Much of this work provides support for the Sharon Temple, a national historic site, and the sole remaining memorial to the broad utopian socialist tradition in Canada. |
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In the Indonesian case, I similarly examine the “transition debate” in the light of the development of Dutch Royal corporations as a governmental strategy to manage the "pauper" as well as the "native". Comparative analysis of Dutch colonialism in Indonesia and British colonialism in Canada provide insights into the historic means by which those strategies Foucault called “governmentality” developed in specific political economic and cultural situations. The emphasis again is on the effects of economic governmentality on development and democracy.
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Recent Publications
Books:
2009 “Union is Strength”: W.L. Mackenzie, the Children of Peace and the Emergence of Joint Stock Democracy in Upper Canada (Toronto, University of Toronto Press).
2000 Colonial "Reformation" in the Highlands of Central Sulawesi, Indonesia, 1892-1995 (Toronto, Anthropological Horizons Series 14, University of Toronto Press).
1993 Awaiting the Millennium: The Children of Peace and the Village of Hope, 1812 -1889 (Toronto, University of Toronto Press). Reprinted 2003.
Articles:
In Press “A Genealogy of Corporate Governmentality in the Realm of the ‘Merchant-King’: The Netherlands Trading Company and the Management of Dutch Paupers” Economy & Society 40(3).
2011 “Policing Production: Corporate Governmentality and the Cultivation System” Focaal: Journal of Historical and Global Anthropology, 2011 (59):
2011 “‘Money bound you – money shall loose you”: Gift Giving, Social Capital and the Meaning of Money in Upper Canada” Comparative Studies in Society and History, 53(2): 1-30.
2010 “Regenten (‘Gentlemanly’) Capitalism: Saint-Simonian Technocracy and the emergence of the ‘Industrial Great Club’ in the mid-Nineteenth-Century Netherlands” Enterprise and Society 11(3): 1-31.
2010 “The Gentlemanly Order & the Politics of Production in the Transition to Capitalism in Upper Canada” Labour/ Le Travail 65(1): 9-45.
2008 “Revolutions without a Revolutionary Moment: Joint Stock Democracy & the Transition to Capitalism in Upper Canada” Canadian Historical Review 89(2): 223-55.
2007 “A Farmers’ Alliance: The Joint Stock Companies of the Home District and the Economic Roots of Deliberative Democracy in Upper Canada” Ontario History XCIX(2): 190-219.
2004 “H(h)ouses, E(e)states and Class: On the Importance of Capitals in central Sulawesi” Bijdragen tot de Taal-, Land- en Volkenkunde. 160 (1): 71-93.
2003 With Deborah James. “An Apartheid of Souls: Dutch and Afrikaner Colonialism and its aftermath: An Introduction.” Itinerario 27 (3/4): 49-80.
2002 “The Miser's Store: Property and Traditional Law in the Governance of the Economy.” Journal of Peasant Studies 29(2): 24-46.
2001 “Sitting in Silence: Self, Emotion and Tradition in the Genesis of a Charismatic Ministry.” Ethos 29 (4): 1-23.
2001 “The Benevolent Colonies of Johannes van den Bosch: Continuities in the Administration of Poverty in the Netherlands and Indonesia” Comparative Studies in Society and History 43(2): 298-328.
2000 “Three weddings and a Performance: Marriage, Households and Development in the Highlands of Central Sulawesi”, American Ethnologist 27(4): 1-23.
2000 “Pillars of Faith: Religious Rationalization in the Netherlands and Indonesia.” Journal for the History of Dutch Missions and Overseas Churches 7(1): 1-23.
1999 “’I was a Stranger, and ye took me in…’: Charity, Moral Economy and the Children of Peace.” Canadian Historical Review. Vol. 80 (4): 624-40.
1999 “Negotiating Parentage: The Political Economy of Kinship in Central Sulawesi, Indonesia.” American Ethnologist Vol. 26 (2): 310-23.
1998 “’Let’s Party’: State Intervention, Discursive Traditionalism and the Labour Process of Highland Rice Cultivators in Central Sulawesi, Indonesia.” Journal of Peasant Studies Vol. 25 (3): 112-30.
1997 “Houses, Hierarchy, Headhunting and Exchange: Rethinking Political Relations in the Southeast Asian Realm of Luwu.” Bijdragen tot de Taal-, Land- en Volkenkunde vol. 153 (3): 311-35.
1995 “The Household and Shared Poverty in the Highlands of Central Sulawesi.” Journal of the Royal Anthropological Institute, incorporating Man n.s. vol. 1 (2): 337-57.
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