ABSTRACT
Contributions by anthropologists to the analysis of the diverse range of economic institutions they have observed have not yet been very impressive. This is partly because of their lack of training in formal economic theory and partly because much analysis by economists which might have been a stimulus may seem remote from the conditions studied by anthropologists. But as time has gone on the bearing of economic conditions on the character of a social system has become more apparent. Moreover, a more marked interest in problems of economic growth in the 'under-developed' countries, and an increasing realization that such growth depends as much on social as on economic conditions, have helped many economists to see more clearly the relevance of social factors to economic decisions. So the way is now open for closer co-operation in the empirical study of economic data, and for a more significant use of their knowledge by anthropologists for the clearer formulation of theory in the socioeconomic field.
