The Socio-Economic Organization of Business Activity in Cuanajo, Michoacan, Mexico: A Test of the Theories of the Institutional Economists

该奖项支持一位文化人类学家对墨西哥小型木工企业的研究。这项研究将检验关于企业内部和企业间交易成本的“制度经济学”理论。该理论预测，这些交易成本决定了一家公司的形式和规模，该理论通过与墨西哥农村地区小型、通常是家族组织的公司的数据对峙，对这一理论进行了测试和推进。这一理论是为了“抽象地”处理所有公司而制定的，但往往无意识地偏向于人们在发达、工业化国家发现的那种大公司。用墨西哥这样欠发达国家的小型家族企业的数据来对抗这一理论，将揭示出逻辑上的不一致和缺陷，可以对其进行修改，以提高其能力和普遍性。

This award supports the research of a cultural anthropologist studying small wood-working firms in Mexico. The research will examine a theory of "institutional economics" concerning the costs of transactions within and between firms. The theory predicts that these transactions costs determine the shape and size of a firm, and this projects tests and advances this theory by confronting it with data from small, often family-organized firms in a rural area of Mexico. The theory was formulated to deal with all firms "in the abstract", but with often unconscious bias towards the sorts of large firms one finds in developed, industrialized countries. Confronting this theory with data from small family firms in a less developed country like Mexico will reveal logical inconsistencies and flaws that can be modified to improve its power and generality.