Question

Discuss the substantivist-formalist debate in Economic Anthropology by contrasting the views of Karl Polanyi and Robbins Burling.

Answer 1

Economic anthropology has two approaches for the study of the economic life of (peasant and peoples).

These two approaches are substantive and formalism

Malinowski in their study of Trobriand islanders describes that the concept of ‘economic man’ in the conventional theory of economy cannot be put to the ancient population. In the study of firth, the Maori economy contends that the primitive man is an economic man that a primitive has a rational type of choices construct on all side a principle known as ‘ calculus of maximization’ and that the formal theory of economics can be put into primitive economic.

Karl Polanyi followed Malinowski he suggested the two senses (meaning) of the word.

The denotation of Substantive is that economy is an ‘instituted process’ and the economy of human is implanted and entangled in the institution like ‘economic’ and ‘non- economic’ that it means to supply of goods and services to provide biological, social wants and this denotation applies to all societies, all the times and at all the places, all people have to utilize resources to conserve themselves disregarding of space and times. The concept of the western economy is capital goods, the motive of profits and savings. Cannot be put on societies of non-industrial. The denotation of substantive of economy simplifies that people depend upon nature and on their fellow-beings for their subsistence and this reliance provides them utility material means.

According to Karl Polanyi, the conventional and formal denotation of the word economy is economizing. It means that person make choices among the various alternative course of action in a manner of rational. The word rational denotes that selecting a course of action that will increase the peoples well being and profit. The Theory of economy is to do with a plan that an individual gets a higher satisfaction in things savings and dispersal of scarce resources. However, this theory is applied to economies of advanced societies.

Substantivists	Formalism
The substantivists are Malinowski (1922), Karl Polanyi, Cyril Belshaw, George Dalton, and Paul Bohannan	The formalist is Raymond Firth, Herskovits and Burlings.
The substantive denotes carry goods to primitive and peasants and advances the life of economic.	Formal denotes carry to economies of advanced societies.
An Anthropologist who adhered to the substantive denotes and narrated, explained, and analyzed the economic life of the people came to acknowledge that as “ substantivists”	An Anthropologist who uses formal meaning examining, analyzing and evaluating or interpreting economic process came to be branded as “ formalists”