ABSTRACT
Anthropological political economy focuses on unequal power in social, cultural, and environmental relations, and attends to power in activity as well as subjectivity. The phrase often is a euphemism for Marx-influenced approaches or for politically left–leaning work, though this is not wholly accurate, for political economy offers penetrating insights and raises significant challenges for anthropology as a whole. Political economy flourished in the political climate of the 1960s and 1970s, including more explicit reference to Marxist theory. Much groundwork for current mainstream anthropology emerged then, including the critique of anthropology’s own history, attention to colonialism and imperialism, and interpreting social and political formations as power relations. However, if anthropology is to enrich political economy, anthropologists must transcend their self-marginalization. Focusing anthropological political economy on sociocultural particularities might convey the impression that anthropology remains specialized in the local and intimate, while the really big issues of political economy belong to other fields.
