Men, Women, and Trade

Abstract

This paper considers one aspect of the relationship between social organization and certain sorts of economic activity, using a particular setting, the internal market system in peasant societies (Mintz, 1959), as a frame of reference. The argument proceeds from the well-known fact that, in many of these market systems, much or even most of the distributive activity is carried on by women, and these women often engage in commerce more or less independently of the economic undertakings of their husbands. In such cases, husband and wife participate in distinguishably different risk structures, an arrangement having particular relevance to the nature of family life and culturally determined sex-role differentiation. Furthermore, since husbands and wives in such cases may carry on not only independent but also different economic pursuits, it would not be surprising if some of the attitudes related to the kind of economic activity also differed along sexual lines. Productive and distributive undertakings require different skills; probably they evoke different temperamental responses as well. One might claim that the tests of success for the middleman are different in character from the tests of success for the agricultural producer; those successful in one pursuit are not necessarily those most likely to succeed in the other. Of course this contention does not preclude some optimum combination of skills; many producers alsoengage successfully in intermediary and distributive activities, and some of the so-called underdeveloped world's most skilled traders began as agricultural producers (Bauer, 1957: 71; Bauer and Yamey, 1957: 104–5).