1 00:00:06,346 --> 00:00:07,793 This holiday season, 2 00:00:07,793 --> 00:00:10,722 people around the world will give and receive presents. 3 00:00:10,722 --> 00:00:13,425 You might even get a knitted sweater from an aunt. 4 00:00:13,425 --> 00:00:17,095 But what if instead of saying "thanks" before consigning it to the closet, 5 00:00:17,095 --> 00:00:19,130 the polite response expected from you 6 00:00:19,130 --> 00:00:22,663 was to show up to her house in a week with a better gift? 7 00:00:22,663 --> 00:00:25,690 Or to vote for her in the town election? 8 00:00:25,690 --> 00:00:28,462 Or let her adopt your first born child? 9 00:00:28,462 --> 00:00:30,922 All of these things might not sound so strange 10 00:00:30,922 --> 00:00:34,228 if you are involved in a gift economy. 11 00:00:34,228 --> 00:00:36,300 This phrase might seem contradictory. 12 00:00:36,300 --> 00:00:39,215 After all, isn't a gift given for free? 13 00:00:39,215 --> 00:00:42,810 But in a gift economy, gifts given without explicit conditions 14 00:00:42,810 --> 00:00:47,112 are used to foster a system of social ties and obligations. 15 00:00:47,112 --> 00:00:50,124 While the market economies we know are formed by relationships 16 00:00:50,124 --> 00:00:52,276 between the things being traded, 17 00:00:52,276 --> 00:00:54,420 a gift economy consists of the relationships 18 00:00:54,420 --> 00:00:57,216 between the people doing the trading. 19 00:00:57,216 --> 00:01:00,750 Gift economies have existed throughout human history. 20 00:01:00,750 --> 00:01:02,337 The first studies of the concept 21 00:01:02,337 --> 00:01:06,834 came from anthropologists Bronislaw Malinowski and Marcel Mauss 22 00:01:06,834 --> 00:01:09,210 who describe the natives of the Trobriand islands 23 00:01:09,210 --> 00:01:12,260 making dangerous canoe journeys across miles of ocean 24 00:01:12,260 --> 00:01:15,633 to exchange shell necklaces and arm bands. 25 00:01:15,633 --> 00:01:18,975 The items traded through this process, known as the Kula Ring, 26 00:01:18,975 --> 00:01:20,542 have no practical use, 27 00:01:20,542 --> 00:01:23,477 but derive importance from their original owners 28 00:01:23,477 --> 00:01:27,017 and carry an obligation to continue the exchange. 29 00:01:27,017 --> 00:01:29,503 Other gift economies may involve useful items, 30 00:01:29,503 --> 00:01:32,829 such as potlatch feast of the Pacific Northwest, 31 00:01:32,829 --> 00:01:37,527 where chiefs compete for prestige by giving away livestock and blankets. 32 00:01:37,527 --> 00:01:40,324 We might say that instead of accumulating material wealth, 33 00:01:40,324 --> 00:01:45,257 participants in a gift economy use it to accumulate social wealth. 34 00:01:45,257 --> 00:01:48,871 Though some instances of gift economies may resemble barter, 35 00:01:48,871 --> 00:01:53,002 the difference is that the original gift is given without any preconditions 36 00:01:53,002 --> 00:01:54,706 or haggling. 37 00:01:54,706 --> 00:01:56,827 Instead, the social norm of reciprocity 38 00:01:56,827 --> 00:02:01,094 obligates recipients to voluntarily return the favor. 39 00:02:01,094 --> 00:02:05,016 But the rules for how and when to do so vary between cultures, 40 00:02:05,016 --> 00:02:08,705 and the return on a gift can take many forms. 41 00:02:08,705 --> 00:02:11,489 A powerful chief giving livestock to a poor man 42 00:02:11,489 --> 00:02:14,001 may not expect goods in return, 43 00:02:14,001 --> 00:02:17,270 but gains social prestige at the debtor's expense. 44 00:02:17,270 --> 00:02:19,891 And among the Toraja people of Indonesia, 45 00:02:19,891 --> 00:02:24,848 the status gained from gift ceremonies even determines land ownership. 46 00:02:24,848 --> 00:02:27,226 The key is to keep the gift cycle going, 47 00:02:27,226 --> 00:02:29,739 with someone always indebted to someone else. 48 00:02:29,739 --> 00:02:31,127 Repaying a gift immediately, 49 00:02:31,127 --> 00:02:33,542 or with something of exactly equal value, 50 00:02:33,542 --> 00:02:37,218 may be read as ending the social relationship. 51 00:02:37,218 --> 00:02:40,693 So, are gift economies exclusive to small-scale societies 52 00:02:40,693 --> 00:02:42,969 outside the industrialized world? 53 00:02:42,969 --> 00:02:44,163 Not quite. 54 00:02:44,163 --> 00:02:46,139 For one thing, even in these cultures, 55 00:02:46,139 --> 00:02:50,492 gift economies function alongside a market system for other exchanges. 56 00:02:50,492 --> 00:02:51,986 And when we think about it, 57 00:02:51,986 --> 00:02:55,530 parts of our own societies work in similar ways. 58 00:02:55,530 --> 00:02:57,583 Communal spaces, such as Burning Man, 59 00:02:57,583 --> 00:03:00,329 operate as a mix of barter and a gift economy, 60 00:03:00,329 --> 00:03:03,711 where selling things for money is strictly taboo. 61 00:03:03,711 --> 00:03:05,174 In art and technology, 62 00:03:05,174 --> 00:03:08,904 gift economies are emerging as an alternative to intellectual property 63 00:03:08,904 --> 00:03:09,994 where artists, 64 00:03:09,994 --> 00:03:11,113 musicians, 65 00:03:11,113 --> 00:03:12,529 and open-source developers 66 00:03:12,529 --> 00:03:15,624 distribute their creative works, not for financial profit, 67 00:03:15,624 --> 00:03:19,908 but to raise their social profile or establish their community role. 68 00:03:19,908 --> 00:03:22,475 And even potluck dinners and holiday gift traditions 69 00:03:22,475 --> 00:03:26,179 involve some degree of reciprocity and social norms. 70 00:03:26,179 --> 00:03:28,191 We might wonder if a gift is truly a gift 71 00:03:28,191 --> 00:03:32,364 if it comes with obligations or involves some social pay off. 72 00:03:32,364 --> 00:03:34,150 But this is missing the point. 73 00:03:34,150 --> 00:03:37,519 Out idea of a free gift without social obligations 74 00:03:37,519 --> 00:03:41,771 prevails only if we already think of everything in market terms. 75 00:03:41,771 --> 00:03:43,233 And in a commericalized world, 76 00:03:43,233 --> 00:03:46,793 the idea of strengthening bonds through giving and reciprocity 77 00:03:46,793 --> 00:03:50,406 may not be such a bad thing, wherever you may live.