Beyond mining: physical commodity traders, market intermediation and the role of (de-)coupling

Stefan Leins

Journal of Cultural Economy, 2025, vol. 18, issue 4, 531-546

Abstract: Economic activities that involve natural resources are often associated with precarious terms of employment, uneven relationships between local communities and state authorities and transregional inequalities. In anthropology, the role of intermediaries who connect producers and consumers in the context of commodity trade remains largely unexplored. In this article, I want to go beyond mining to share an ethnographic account of how physical commodity traders sell and buy goods and organise logistical operations and to elaborate on how their mode of trading influences questions of social and economic inequalities. In doing so, I wish to shift the focus of research on mining and capitalism from the sites of production to the sites of exchange and to show how market intermediaries play a critical role in creating and sustaining unequal relationships between commodity producers and consumers through what I call (de-)coupling.

Date: 2025
References: Add references at CitEc
Citations:

Downloads: (external link)
http://hdl.handle.net/10.1080/17530350.2024.2393170 (text/html)
Access to full text is restricted to subscribers.

Related works:
This item may be available elsewhere in EconPapers: Search for items with the same title.

Export reference: BibTeX RIS (EndNote, ProCite, RefMan) HTML/Text

Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:taf:jculte:v:18:y:2025:i:4:p:531-546

Ordering information: This journal article can be ordered from
http://www.tandfonline.com/pricing/journal/RJCE20

DOI: 10.1080/17530350.2024.2393170

Access Statistics for this article

Journal of Cultural Economy is currently edited by Michael Pryke, Joe Deville, Tony Bennett, Liz McFall and Melinda Cooper

More articles in Journal of Cultural Economy from Taylor & Francis Journals
Bibliographic data for series maintained by ().