Studies on Economy, Money, & Markets

This laboratory aims to build a space for discussing and investigating the relations between money, markets and transnationalization in Haiti and in the Caribbean region. The Haitian social and economic situation demands a unique analytical approach to economic processes and facts. The laboratory’s study of production and markets is based on an evaluation of contemporary economic practices in both rural areas and towns, the urban and rural organization of markets, the inclusion of individuals and families in multiple national and international market and migration flows, and the social significations and notions of credit and money in Haitian society.

The Laboratory currently includes four lines of research:

1. Money, State and Society
2. Markets and Transactions
3. Family and Reproductive Networks
4. Economy and Religion

Electricity Services in Haiti: A Household Survey (2015)
​This study aims to understand the perceptions of Haitians on electricity service provision in Haiti. Financed by the World Bank Group

Disaster Risk Reduction and Access to Financial Capital (2011)
Karen Jacobsen, Associate Professor and Research Director, Refugees and Forced Migration Program,
Feinstein International Center, Tufts University

Publications generated by this project:
Disaster Risk Reduction and Financial Strategies of the Poor
Disaster Risk Reduction and Livelihoods


The Water Market in Bel Air: Social Networks, Distribution and Commercialization  (Jan to June 2009)
A qualitative perspective on the organization of the market for water in Bel Air, Port-au-Prince, Haiti.
 In consultation with the Center for the Study of the Economy and Culture (NUCEC), the Federal University of Rio de Janeiro.  Funded by VIVA RIO, Brazil

Publications generated by this project:
The Social Life of Water
Federico Neiburg and Natacha Nicaise, Nucleo de Pesquisas em Cultura e Economia, Federal University of Rio de Janeiro and Viva Rio-Brazil/Haiti.

Markets and Money in Port-au-Prince.  A collective ethnography of the international space (2008-2010)
Research project conducted by the Economy and Culture Study Center (NUCEC), Postgraduate Program in Social Anthropology (PPGAS), Museu National (MN), Federal University of Rio de Janeiro (UFRJ).  Financed by the National Scientific and Technological Research Council (CNPQ) - Brazil

Publications generated by this project:
Garbage, Stigmatization, Commerce, Politics
Federico Neiburg and Natacha Nicaise, Nucleo de Pesquisas em Cultura e Economia, Federal University of Rio de Janeiro and Viva Rio-Brazil/Haiti.


DISSERTATION PROJECTS

The Loas and the Orixas, Afro-American ancestors: a comparison of the social meanings of money, property and market in Haitian vodoun and Brazilian candomblé (2007-open)
Doctoral Student at PPGAS/MN/UFRJ-  Brazil, in collaboration with the Religion and Society Laboratory