Keywords
anthropology
voluntary associations
nonprofit organizations
How to Cite
Abstract
The profile of anthropologists and anthropological approaches in current third sector research is relatively low. The first part of the paper reviews the status of anthropological work dealing organizations generally before focusing more specifically on work on the third sector. This paper notes that anthropologists have more recently done less work in this area, but shows how more recent anthropological work on bureaucracy, development and policy issues is highly relevant to third sector research and the second part of the paper briefly reviews such work. The paper concludes that anthropological research can firstly reveal more of the hidden third sector by providing detailed micro-accounts; secondly it can widen the scope of third sector research (by throwing light on the diversity of organizational life and challenging Western bias and ethnocentricity), and thirdly deepen the analysis of third sector research through its distinctive use of an actor-centered, process-based analysis of highly complex issues (such as organizational culture, values). The paper concludes with the observation that closer engagement with third sector research might also benefit current anthropology, which has been criticized in some quarters as losing relevance to the contemporary world.
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