Payment ecologies
From pathways in a jungle of currencies to vectors of community money
Bibliographic Data
| ID | 2230696 |
|---|---|
| Authors | Daromir Rudnyckyj (0000-0003-3940-4881, University of Victoria, corresponding author) |
| Year | 2025 |
| Volume | 15 |
| Issue | 2 |
| Pages | 557-561 |
| Publication date | 2025-09-01 |
| Peer Reviewed | Yes |
| Open Access | Yes |
| Type | ARTICLE |
| Venue | Hau Journal of Ethnographic Theory (JOURNAL) |
| Journal identifiers | ISSN: 2049-1115 • E-ISSN: 2575-1433 |
| Publisher | HAU-N.E.T (PUBLISHER • GB) |
| DOI | 10.1086/736280 |
| OpenAlex | W4412746577 |
| Language | EN |
| Citations received | 1 |
| References cited | 4 |
University of VictoriaIn her Lewis Henry Morgan Lectures, delivered in 1997 and published under the title Marginal gains in 2004, Jane Guyer describes what she calls a "jungle of currencies" circulating in the Congo River basin in the early twentieth century (Guyer 2004: 32).Guyer focuses on a collection made by a Belgian colonial official, Van de Weyer, who meticulously documented sixty-eight items, including tools, weapons, adornments, musical instruments, and various kinds of raw materials.Guyer notes that "items identified as money figure prominently" in the inventory and include objects such as brass wire, iron machetes, and slender metal currency objects variously called monsea, bokana, and kwa (2004: 35).In this vibrant zone of riverine trade, Guyer explains that the Libinza region was characterized by "an intricate multiplicity of currencies" that formed "a vast exchange corridor" along the Congo River and its tributaries.Guyer illustrates this monetary multiplicity, as follows:Even the most minor transaction was an asymmetrical conversion in the sense that it assumed directionality; it referred back to a place, a localized value and a past and was endowed with a new attribute in the transaction that afforded "candidacy" . . .for travel along new pathways.The multiple coexisting currencies symbolized, mediated, and were themselves items in the directional orientation of the flow of goods.In every case, either the final money forms or the materials to make them originated from outside Libinza society.All were, in fact, interconvertible through denominational processes, but at one time, each currency within each group was more or less oriented toward one kind of transaction versus another.In principle, at one time, only one currency in each society, mediated social payments-fines, bridewealth, and so on-and others mediated the purchase of utilities, such as foodstuffs, and productive investments, such as canoes
Business · Payment · Banking stability, regulation, efficiency · Housing, Finance, and Neoliberalism · Sharing Economy and Platforms · Finance
| Unique citing works | 1 |
|---|---|
| Citations per year | 1 |
| Citation span | 2026 - 2026 (1) |
| Citation velocity | current |
| Highly cited | No |
| Citation types | Neutral: 1 |