Doctoral Dissertation Research: International Constraints and Informal Trade Networks

The term informal (or grey) economy refers to businesses, economic activities, and workers that are not government regulated and are not captured in measures of national GDP or GNP. Even so, the informal economy is known to comprise a significant part of world economic activity: the International Labor Organization estimates that globally, it employs over half of the world's labor force. The research supported by this award takes a multidimensional approach to the question of how informality plays out in an increasingly globalized economic environment. The focus is on the nexus of three inter-related dynamics: vernacular economic practices, state surveillance, and the effects of global forces. The research is important because informal economic activities are increasingly felt beyond the local level and can produce significant unintended effects on the outcomes of international economic regulatory policies and practices. The research will be conducted by State University of New York, Binghamton, anthropology doctoral student, Ehsan Lor Afshar, with the oversight of Dr. Thomas M. Wilson. The researcher will engage in research in a region divided by the international borders that have been central to major informal cross-border trade networks. Examining how these networks interact with global regulation, such as the international framework for Anti Money Laundering and Counter Financing Terrorism and regional economic sanctions, will provide a revealing case study of the potentials for such programs and policies to be efficacious, reconfigured, or transformed at the local level. The researcher will collect data through a mix of anthropological methods: (1) participant observation in a major wholesale market's everyday life, with a focus on three divergent types of merchandise (foodstuffs, cloth goods, and electronics); (2) surveys of a merchant sample; (3) semi-structured interviews with merchant association leaders, other NGOs, government officials, and a sub-sample of merchants; (4) focus groups of merchants and community leaders; and (5) archival research. The research will advance social scientific understanding of how global financial regulations and sanctions interact with local unregulated or semi-regulated economic practices. Research findings will be helpful for state officials and global organizations by clarifying the picture of the effects of transnational policies on the ground. This award reflects NSF's statutory mission and has been deemed worthy of support through evaluation using the Foundation's intellectual merit and broader impacts review criteria.