“But if all maximizing models are really arguing is that “people will always seek to maximize something,” then they obviously can’t predict anything, which means employing them can hardly be said to make anthropology more scientific. All they really add… — David Graeber Copy Share Image
People don't have an ongoing relation unless it's a form of debt because everything is an exchange, so ongoing relationships are incomplete exchanges, and… — David Graeber Copy Share
I would like, then, to end by putting in a good word for the non-industrious poor. At least they aren’t hurting anyone. Insofar as… — David Graeber Copy Share
“But if Smith was right, and gold and silver became money through the natural workings of the market completely independently of governments, then wouldn't… — David Graeber Copy Share
“A revolution on a world scale will take a very long time. But it is also possible to recognize that it is already starting… — David Graeber Copy Share
“money has no essence. It's not "really" anything; therefore, its nature has always been and presumably always will be a matter of political contention.” — David Graeber Copy Share
We don't live in a capitalist totality. Capitalism couldn't survive as a totality anyway. We live in this complex system and we already live… — David Graeber Copy Share
The working poor are the people suffering out subprime mortgages and fatal loans and more and more of our money - you know, capitalism… — David Graeber Copy Share
“Solitary pleasures will always exist, but for most human beings, the most pleasurable activities almost always involve sharing something: music, food, liquor, drugs, gossip,… — David Graeber Copy Share
“The criminalization of debt, then, was the criminalization of the very basis of human society. It cannot be overemphasized that in a small community,… — David Graeber Copy Share
If you imagine that everything is an exchange, then we're supposed to just transact and walk away. If we haven't walked away and we… — David Graeber Copy Share
“As Pierre Bourdieu was later to point out in describing a similar economy of trust in contemporary Algeria: it’s quite possible to turn honor… — David Graeber Copy Share
[A] great embarrassing fact… haunts all attempts to represent the market as the highest form of human freedom: that historically, impersonal, commercial markets originate… — David Graeber Copy Share
“As the events of 2011 reveal, the age of revolutions is by no means over. The human imagination stubbornly refuses to die. And the… — David Graeber Copy Share
