This book explores globalization as actually experienced by most of the world's people, buying goods from street vendors brought by traders moving past borders and across continents under the radar of the law. The dimensions and practices of 'globalization from below' are depicted and analyzed in detail by a team of international scholars. Topics covered include the 'New Silk Road', African traders in China, street hawking in Calcutta and pirate CDs in Mexico. The chapters provide intimate portrayals of routes, markets and people in locations across the globe and explore theories that can help make sense of these complex and fascinating case studies. Students of globalization, economic anthropology and developing-world economics will find the book invaluable.

Part of the International Library of Policy Analysis series, this book provides the first detailed examination of the practice of policy analysis in Mexico. Whilst shaped by the legacy of the Mexican state's colonial history as well as by recent social, economic and political developments, the study of policy analysis within Mexico provides important comparative lessons for other countries. Contributors study the nature of policy analysis at different sectors and levels of government as well as by non-governmental actors, such as unions, business, NGOs and the media, promoting the use of evidence-based policy analysis, leading to better policy results. The book is a vital resource for academics and students of policy studies, public management, political science and comparative policy studies.

This book explores globalization as actually experienced by most of the world's people, buying goods from street vendors brought by traders moving past borders and across continents under the radar of the law. The dimensions and practices of 'globalization from below' are depicted and analyzed in detail by a team of international scholars. Topics covered include the 'New Silk Road', African traders in China, street hawking in Calcutta and pirate CDs in Mexico. The chapters provide intimate portrayals of routes, markets and people in locations across the globe and explore theories that can help make sense of these complex and fascinating case studies. Students of globalization, economic anthropology and developing-world economics will find the book invaluable.

The Popular Economy in Urban Latin America: Informality, Materiality and Gender in Commerce advances comparative knowledge and theoretical reflections on urban popular economies in Latin America by going beyond the lenses of so-called informal and street economies. It develops a cultural-economic perspective on the popular urban economy and provides new insights in key concepts such as informality, materiality, and gender. Based on ethnographic work and archival research, the authors of this volume address cases in Brazil, Bolivia, Cuba, Ecuador, Mexico and Peru. The guiding questions of these case studies are: which actors, and with what agencies, are forming and transforming street markets and other place-based economies, and with what effects? What are the emerging lines of tension in these particular economies? Urban economies in Latin America are becoming increasingly diverse and internally stratified. Itinerant traders work side-by-side with permanent street and market vendors, shopkeepers, and wholesalers who conduct business trips to neighboring countries and China several times a year. International trade and investment as well as technological change foster new forms of interaction between traders, companies and customers, but also create new imbalances in economic communities. Remaining sensitive to history, gender, and urban politics, this volume offers an ethnographically informed cultural and socio-material perspective on how popular economies and commerce thrive, transform, and persist in Latin American cities today.