“Culture” is a slippery concept, used in many different ways by historians, anthropologists and economists. Jones’ book is more a survey than the critique implied by the title, but it is an extremely useful and well-presented survey. I prefer this, since it is best to start off with some idea of who has thought and said what about the subject before plunging into debates. Presumptions about culture, especially about whether it determines how people act economically, or merely shapes itself on the basis of how people must act economically, underlie all sorts of theories and descriptions in the three fields. Usually these presumptions are shared by some group of thinkers without them being explicitly stated. Arguments between different groups, with different presumptions, usually result in confusion. But a number of works, in all three disciplines, either illustrate or make explicit particular ideas of culture’s relation to behaviour and economies. Scholars have taken their cues from these seminal works, and policy-makers adhered to any of several contradictory attitudes generated by them. Some have been downright silly (such as “the end of history” and “clash of civilizations” tom-foolery). Jones presents most of them fairly dispassionately, but he is obviously impatient with the stupider ones, and does not hide it. Of special interest to me is his sensible discussion of the “Asian Values” mystique, promoted by many East Asian economists and politicians, and often uncritically accepted elsewhere. (He cites Steve Muhlberger and myself in this discussion, so I could hardly fail to find it interesting.) On the whole, Jones gets the horse in front of the cart rather than the other way round. He plumps for common-sense causation when it is possible, and holds back his conclusions when causation cannot be discerned, rather than appeal to enigmatic collective properties.
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