Shadow trading by international tourists in the Soviet Union

In 'top down' conceptualizations of globalization, people often enter the analytical picture merely as resisters to globalization or as receivers of corporate produced goods, messages and ideas. This article, in contrast, focuses on a process in which 'ordinary' people are the active makers of global processes and meanings. I describe the transnational trade network between post-Soviet countries and Turkey, in which Western fashions and images get circulated and transformed through the activities of informal entrepreneurs. I thus challenge accounts of globalization in which the dissemination of images is depicted as a top down process originating in corporations located in metropolitan countries. Based on ethnographic evidence collected in Istanbul and Moscow on the informal 'shuttle trade', I demonstrate that the mobility of 'ordinary' people across borders facilitates the flows of signs and images. Moreover, Western images and fashions get remoulded and acquire new meanings in the process of circulation. Copyright (c) 2007 The Author. Journal Compilation (c) 2007 Joint Editors and Blackwell Publishing Ltd..

Section: Consumption In the Soviet Union And Aftermentioning

confidence: 99%

Shuttling Goods, Weaving Consumer Tastes: Informal Trade between Turkey and Russia

Yükseker

2007

“…As a consequence, OAMs in the communist economy were continually under the threat of police raids or -at besttolerated as suspicious but irrelevant distortions of the production and distribution system. From various sources, however, we can learn that OAMs existed not only in more tolerant Hungary (Dankó, 1963;1980) but also in the USSR as well (Katsenelinboigen, 1977;Alexeev and Sayer, 1987;Fish and Lynn, 1989) and the sparse information we can find seems to show an increase in this activity as communism developed through stagnation into over-maturity during the 1980s (Wedel, 1986;Böröcz, 1992).…”

mentioning

confidence: 98%

The Development of Open‐air Markets in East‐Central Europe

Sík

Wallace

1999

This paper considers the way in which open‐air markets have developed as a legacy of both the communist and pre‐communist systems, but have taken distinctive forms in the post‐communist context. The small‐scale capitalism represented by open‐air markets is often informal and not often analysed in the context of the transformation process in East and Central Europe. However, this paper argues that they can represent an important indicator of some aspects of the nature and extent of economic and social transformation. The paper considers theoretical insights for analysing open‐air markets and particular features of post‐communist open‐air markets: the degree of informalization; the role of ethnic communities; moral perspectives on markets; open‐air markets and social capital or other forms of informal social control; and the role of social structure in understanding open‐air markets. Cet article analyse la façon dont les marchés en plein air, se sont développés à partir de leurs origines dans les systèmes pré‐communistes et communistes, tout en prenant des formes distinctes dans le contexte post‐communiste. Le capitalisme à petite échelle représenté par les marchés en plein air est souvent informel et rarement analysé dans le contexte du processus de transformation en Europe de l’est et en Europe centrale. Néanmoins, cet article soutient qu’ils peuvent ?tre un indicateur important de certains aspects de la nature et du degré de transformation sociale et économique. Les éléments théoriques sont mis en relation avec l’analyse des marchés en plein air et leurs éléments caractéristiques après le communisme: L’importance de l’economie soutenue; le rôle des communautés ethniques; les perspectives morales sur les marchés; les marchés en plein air et le capital social ou d’autres formes de contrôle social officieux; et le rôle de la structure sociale pour comprendre les marchés en plein air.

“…Illegal and semi‐legal cross‐border trading activities already existed in the former socialist countries before the iron curtain fell (Fish and Edwards, 1989). CBST, however, appeared as a mass phenomenon immediately after the opening of the borders between East and West.…”

Section: Cross‐border Small‐scale Trading (Cbst) In Europe — An Overvmentioning

confidence: 99%

Cross‐border Small‐scale Trading in South‐Eastern Europe: Do Embeddedness and Social Capital Explain Enough?

Egbert

2006

The article analyses cross-border small-scale trading (CBST) from the perspective of New Institutional Economics. It offers an alternative analytical starting point to this topic, which is mainly tackled by sociologists and anthropologists. It is argued that concepts like social capital or social embeddedness can be of certain analytical use but that they hardly suffice to explain human behaviour in a detailed manner. The case of reference is the institution of bribery as it evolved in the first half of the 1990s at the Bulgarian-Turkish border. Copyright (c) 2006 The Author. Journal Compilation (c) 2006 Joint Editors and Blackwell Publishing Ltd.