Ethical Issues for Social Anthropologists: A North American Perspective on Long-Term Research in Mexico

The Misunderstanding of Mexican Community Life in Urban Apartment Space: A Case Study in Applied Anthropology and Community Policing

“…Some anthropologists have been concerned with the history of the discipline and have pursued research agendas since the Viet Nam era that would neither jeopardize them as individual researchers, nor the reputation of the discipline with accusations of misalignment with political powers (Wax 2004; Gusterson 2003). Thus, anthropologists have attempted to construct an applied anthropology that would not repeat mistakes of the past that led to anthropology's own culpability, however misrepresented, innocent or naive, in continuing or extending the abuse, degradation, and harm to communities they had hoped to serve (Huizer 1979;Kemper and Royce 1997;Onoge 1979). As a result, few power-based entities such as police forces have utilized anthropology's practical and experiential knowledge and community-based methodologies beyond the incorporation of ethnographies or other texts that focus on the cultural practices of particular ethnic groups.…”