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== Principles of gift exchange ==
According to anthropologist Jonathan Parry, discussion on the nature of gifts, and of a separate sphere of gift exchange that would constitute an economic system, has been plagued by the [[Ethnocentrism|ethnocentric]] use of a modern, western, market society-based conception of the gift applied as if it were a cross-cultural,universal pan-historicalacross universalculture and time. However, he claims that anthropologists, through analysis of a variety of cultural and historical forms of exchange, have established that no universal practice exists.<ref>{{cite journal |last=Parry |first=Jonathan |title=The Gift, the Indian Gift and the 'Indian Gift' |journal=Man |year=1986 |volume=21 |issue=3 |pages=453–473 |doi=10.2307/2803096|jstor=2803096 |s2cid=152071807 }}</ref> His classic summation ofSimilarly, the gift exchange debate highlighted that ideologiesidea of thea "''pure gift"'' "areis "most likely to arise in highly differentiated societies with an advanced division of labour and a significant commercial sector" and need to be distinguished from non-market "prestations".<ref name="Parry 1986 467">{{cite journal |last=Parry |first=Jonathan |title=The Gift, the Indian Gift and the 'Indian Gift' |journal=Man |year=1986 |volume=21 |issue=3 |pages=467 |doi=10.2307/2803096|jstor=2803096 |s2cid=152071807 }}</ref> According to Weiner, to speak of a "gift economy" in a non-market society is to ignore the distinctive features of their exchange relationships, as the early classic debate between [[Bronislaw Malinowski]] and [[Marcel Mauss]] demonstrated.<ref name="Mauss">{{cite book |last=Mauss |first=Marcel |title=The Gift: Forms and Functions of Exchange in Archaic Societies |year=1970 |publisher=Cohen & West |location=London}}</ref><ref name="Weiner">{{cite book |last=Weiner |first=Annette |title=Inalienable Possessions: The Paradox of Keeping-while-Giving |year=1992 |publisher=University of California Press |location=Berkeley}}</ref> Gift exchange is frequently "[[Embeddedness|embedded]]" in political, kin, or religious institutions, and therefore does not constitute an "''economic"'' system per se.<ref name="gregory">{{cite book |last=Gregory |first=Chris |title=Gifts and Commodities |year=1982 |publisher=Academic Press |location=London |pages=6–9}}</ref>
===Property and alienability===
Gift-giving is a form of transfer of property rights over particular objects. The nature of those property rights varies from society to society, from culture to culture,. andThey are not universal. The nature of gift-giving is thus altered by the type of property regime in place.<ref name="hann">{{cite book |last=Hann |first=C.M. |title=Property Relations: Renewing the Anthropological Tradition |year=1998 |publisher=Cambridge University Press |location=Cambridge |pages=4}}</ref>
[[Bundle of rights|Property is not a thing]], but a relationship amongst people about things.<ref>{{cite journal |last=Sider |first=Gerald M. |title=The Ties That Bind: Culture and Agriculture, Property and Propriety in the Newfoundland Village Fishery |journal=Social History |year=1980 |volume=5 |issue=1 |pages=2–3, 17 |doi=10.1080/03071028008567469|doi-access=free }}</ref> According to [[Chris Hann]], propertyIt is a social relationship that governs the conduct of people with respect to the use and disposition of things. Anthropologists analyze these relationships in terms of a variety of actors' (individual or corporate) "[[bundle of rights]]" over objects.<ref name="hann" /> An example is the current debates around [[intellectual property right]]s.<ref>{{cite journal |last=Coleman |first=Gabriella |title=The Political Agnosticism of Free and Open Source Software and the Inadvertent Politics of Contrast |journal=Anthropological Quarterly |year=2004 |volume=77 |issue=3 |pages=507–519 |doi=10.1353/anq.2004.0035|hdl=10524/1583 |s2cid=143633315 |url=http://evols.library.manoa.hawaii.edu/bitstream/10524/1583/1/09_pdfsam_aq_cultures_opensources.pdf |hdl-access=free }}</ref><ref>{{cite journal |last=Levitt |first=Leon |title=On property, Intellectual Property, the Culture of Property, and Software Pirating |journal=Anthropology of Work Review |year=1987 |volume=8 |issue=1 |pages=7–9 |doi=10.1525/awr.1987.8.1.7}}</ref><ref>{{cite journal |last=Friedman |first=Jonathan |journal=American Ethnologist |year=1999 |volume=26 |issue=4 |pages=1001–1002 |doi=10.1525/ae.1999.26.4.1001 |title=The Cultural Life of Intellectual Properties: Authorship, Appropriation, and the Law}}</ref><ref>{{cite journal |last=Aragon |first=Lorraine |author2=James Leach |title=Arts and Owners: Intellectual property law and the politics of scale in Indonesian Arts |journal=American Ethnologist |year=2008 |volume=35 |issue=4 |pages=607–631 |doi=10.1111/j.1548-1425.2008.00101.x}}</ref><ref>{{cite journal |last=Coombe |first=Rosemary J. |title=Cultural and Intellectual Properties: Occupying the Colonial Imagination |journal=PoLAR: Political and Legal Anthropology Review |year=1993 |volume=16 |issue=1 |pages=8–15 |doi=10.1525/pol.1993.16.1.8}}</ref> Hann and Strangelove both give the example ofTake a purchased book (an object that he owns), over which the author retains a "copyright". Although the book is a commodity, bought and sold, it has not been completely "alienated" from its creator, who maintains a hold over it; the owner of the book is limited in what he can do with the book by the rights of the creator.<ref>{{cite book |last=Chris Hann |first=Keith Hart |title=Economic Anthropology: History, Ethnography, Critique |year=2011 |publisher=Polity Press |location=Cambridge |page=158}}</ref><ref>{{cite book |last=Strangelove |first=Michael |title=The Empire of Mind: Digital Piracy and the Anti-Capitalist Movement |year=2005 |publisher=University of Toronto Press |location=Toronto |pages=92–96}}</ref> Weiner has argued that the ability to give while retaining a right to the gift/commodity is a critical feature of the gifting cultures described by Malinowski and Mauss, and explains, for example, why some gifts such as Kula valuables return to their original owners after an incredible journey around the Trobriand islands. The gifts given in Kula exchange still remain, in some respects, the property of the giver.<ref name="Weiner" />
In the example used above, "copyright" is one of those bundled rights that regulate the use and disposition of a book. Gift-giving in many societies is complicated because "private property" owned by an individual may be quite limited in scope (see {{format link|#The commons}} below).<ref name="hann" /> Productive resources, such as land, may be held by members of a corporate group (such as a lineage), but only some members of that group may have "[[Use (law)|use rights]]". When many people hold rights over the same objects, gifting has very different implications than the gifting of private property; only some of the rights in that object may be transferred, leaving that object still tied to its corporate owners. AnthropologistAs Annette Weiner refers tosuch, these types of objects asare "[[inalienable possessions]]", andsimultaneously to the process as "keepingkept while giving"given.<ref name="Weiner" />
===Gift versus prestation===
[[File:Kula bracelet.jpg|thumbnail|A Kula necklace, with its distinctive red shell-disc beads, from the Trobriand Islands]]
Malinowski's study of the [[Kula ring]]<ref>{{cite book |last=Malinowski |first=Bronislaw |title=Argonauts of the Western Pacific : an account of native enterprise and adventure in the archipelagoes of Melanesian New Guinea |year=1984 |orig-year=1922 |publisher=Waveland Press |location=Prospect Heights, Ill.}}</ref> became the subject of debate with the French anthropologist, Marcel Mauss, author of "[[The Gift (Mauss book)|The Gift]]" ("Essai sur le don", 1925).<ref name="Mauss" /> Parry argued that Malinowski emphasized the exchange of goods between ''individuals'', and their selfish motives for gifting: they expected a return of equal or greater value. Malinowski argued that [[Reciprocity (cultural anthropology)|reciprocity]] is an implicit part of gifting, andthat there is no "free gift" withoutfree of expectation.<ref name="parry">{{cite journal |last=Parry |first=Jonathan |title=The Gift, the Indian Gift and the 'Indian Gift' |journal=Man |year=1986 |volume=21 |issue=3 |pages=466–469 |doi=10.2307/2803096|jstor=2803096 |s2cid=152071807 }}</ref>
In contrast, Mauss emphasized that the gifts were not between individuals, but between representatives of larger collectives. These gifts were a "''total prestation",'' a service provided out of obligation, like "community service".<ref name="Hann, Chris 2011 50">{{cite book |last=Hann, Chris |first=Hart, Keith |title=Economic Anthropology: History, Ethnography, Critique |year=2011 |publisher=Polity Press |location=Cambridge |page=50}}</ref> They were not alienable commodities to be bought and sold, but, like [[Crown Jewels of the United Kingdom|crown jewels]], embodied the reputation, history and identity of a "corporate kin group", such as a line of kings. Given the stakes, Mauss asked "why anyone would give them away?" His answer was an enigmatic concept, "''the spirit of the gift".'' Parry believes that much of the confusion (and resulting debate) was due to a bad translation. Mauss appeared to be arguing that a return gift is given to maintain the relationship between givers; a failure to return a gift ends the relationship and the promise of any future gifts.
Both Malinowski and Mauss agreed that in non-market societies, where there was no clear institutionalized economic exchange system, gift/prestation exchange served economic, kinship, religious and political functions that could not be clearly distinguished from each other, and which mutually influenced the nature of the practice.<ref name="parry" />
===Inalienable possessions===
[[File:Klallam people at Port Townsend.jpg|thumb | right | Watercolor by [[James G. Swan]] depicting the [[Klallam]] people of chief [[Chetzemoka]] at [[Port Townsend]], with one of Chetzemoka's wives distributing [[potlatch]]]]
Mauss'The concept of "total prestations" was further developed by Annette Weiner, who revisited Malinowski's fieldsite in the Trobriand Islands. Her critique was twofold:. firstFirst, Trobriand Island society is matrilineal, and women hold much economic and political power, but their exchanges were ignored by Malinowski. Secondly, she developed Mauss' argument about reciprocity and the "spirit of the gift" in terms of "[[inalienable possessions]]: the paradox of keeping while giving".<ref name="Weiner" /> Weiner contrasted "moveable goods", which can be exchanged, with "immoveable goods" that serve to draw the gifts back (in the Trobriand case, male Kula gifts with women's landed property). She argues that theThe goods given, likeon crownthe jewels,islands are so identifiedlinked withto particular groups, that even when given away, they are not truly alienated. Such goods depend on the existence of particular kinds of kinship groups in society.
French anthropologist Maurice Godelier<ref>{{cite book |last=Godelier |first=Maurice |title=The Enigma of the Gift |year=1999 |publisher=Polity Press |location=Cambridge}}</ref> continued this analysis in "''The Enigma of the Gift"'' (1999). Albert Schrauwers argued that the kinds of societies used as examples by Weiner and Godelier (including the [[Kula ring]] in the Trobriands, the [[Potlatch]] of the [[indigenous peoples of the Pacific Northwest Coast]], and the [[Toraja]] of [[South Sulawesi]], [[Indonesia]]) are all characterized by ranked aristocratic kin groups that fit [[Claude Lévi-Strauss]]' model of "''House Societies"'' (where "''house"'' refers to both noble lineage and their landed estate). He argues that totalTotal prestations are given to preserve landed estates identified with particular kin groups and maintain their place in a ranked society.<ref>{{cite journal |last=Schrauwers |first=Albert |title=H(h)ouses, E(e)states and class: On the importance of capitals in central Sulawesi |journal=Bijdragen tot de Taal-, Land- en Volkenkunde |year=2004 |volume=160 |issue=1 |pages=72–94 |doi=10.1163/22134379-90003735|s2cid=128968473 |doi-access=free }}</ref>
===Reciprocity and the "spirit of the gift"===
[[Chris Gregory]] argued that [[Reciprocity (cultural anthropology)|reciprocity]] is a dyadic exchange relationship that we characterize, imprecisely, as gift-giving. Gregory argued that one gives gifts to friends and potential enemies in order to establish a relationship, by placing them in debt. He also claimed that in order for such a relationship to persist, there must be a time lag between the gift and counter-gift; one or the other partner must always be in debt. Marshall Sahlins stated thatgave birthday gifts areas an example. of this: theyThey are separated in time so that one partner feels the obligation to make a return gift;. and toTo forget the return gift may be enough to end the relationship. Gregory stated that without a relationship of debt, there is no reciprocity, and that this is what distinguishes a gift economy from a "''true'' gift", given with no expectation of return (something Sahlins calls "generalized''generalised reciprocity":;'' see below).<ref>{{cite book |last=Gregory |first=Chris |title=Gifts and Commodities |year=1982 |publisher=Academic Press |location=London |pages=189–194}}</ref>
[[Marshall Sahlins]], an American cultural anthropologist, identified three main types of reciprocity in his book ''Stone Age Economics'' (1972). Gift or ''generalized reciprocity'' is the exchange of goods and services without keeping track of their exact value, but often with the expectation that their value will balance out over time. ''Balanced or Symmetrical reciprocity'' occurs when someone gives to someone else, expecting a fair and tangible return at a specified amount, time, and place. Market or ''negative reciprocity'' is the exchange of goods and services where each party intends to profit from the exchange, often at the expense of the other. Gift economies, or generalized reciprocity, occurred within closely knit kin groups, and the more distant the exchange partner, the more balanced or negative the exchange became.<ref name="Sahlins 1972">{{cite book |last=Sahlins |first=Marshall |author-link=Marshall Sahlins |title=Stone Age Economics |url=https://archive.org/details/stoneageeconomic0000sahl |url-access=registration |publisher=Aldine-Atherton |location=Chicago |year=1972 |isbn=0202010996}}</ref>
The relationship of new market exchange systems to indigenous non-market exchange remained a perplexing question for anthropologists. [[Paul Bohannan]] argued that the Tiv of Nigeria had three [[spheres of exchange]], and that only certain kinds of goods could be exchanged in each sphere; each sphere had its own form of special-purpose money. However, the market and universal money allowed goods to be traded between spheres and thus damaged established social relationships.<ref>{{cite journal |last=Bohannan |first=Paul |s2cid=154892567 |title=The Impact of money on an African subsistence economy |journal=The Journal of Economic History |year=1959 |volume=19 |issue=4 |pages=491–503 |doi=10.1017/S0022050700085946}}</ref> Jonathan Parry and [[Maurice Bloch]] argued in "Money and the Morality of Exchange" (1989), that the "transactional order" through which long-term social reproduction of the family occurs has to be preserved as separate from short-term market relations.<ref>{{cite book |last=Parry |first=Jonathan |title=Money and the Morality of Exchange |year=1989 |publisher=Cambridge University Press |location=Cambridge |pages=28–30 |author-link=Introduction: Money and the Morality of Exchange |author2=Maurice Bloch}}</ref> It is the long-term social reproduction of the family that is sacralized by religious rituals such baptisms, weddings and funerals, and characterized by gifting.
In such situations where gift-giving and market exchange were intersecting for the first time, some anthropologists contrasted them as polar opposites. This opposition was classically expressed by Chris Gregory in his book "Gifts and Commodities" (1982). Gregory argued that:
{{Blockquote| Commodity exchange is an exchange of ''alienable'' objects between people who are in a state of reciprocal ''independence'' that establishes a ''quantitative'' relationship between the ''objects'' exchanged ... Gift exchange is an exchange of ''inalienable'' objects between people who are in a state of reciprocal ''dependence'' that establishes a ''qualitative'' relationship between the ''transactors'' (emphasis added).<ref>{{cite book |last=Gregory |first=Chris |title=Gifts and Commodities |year=1982 |publisher=Academic Press |location=London |pages=100–101}}</ref>}}
Gregory contrasts gift and commodity exchange according to five criteria:<ref>{{Cite web |url=http://haubooks.org/viewbook/gifts-and-commodities/10_ch03 |title=Gifts and Commodities {{!}} Chapter III: Gifts and commodities: Circulation|website=haubooks.org|access-date=2016-12-21}}</ref>
But other anthropologists refused to see these different "[[Spheres of exchange|exchange spheres]]" as such polar opposites. [[Marilyn Strathern]], writing on a similar area in Papua New Guinea, dismissed the utility of the contrasting setup in "The Gender of the Gift" (1988).<ref>{{cite book |last=Strathern |first=Marilyn |title=The Gender of the Gift: Problems with Women and Problems with Society in Melanesia |year=1988 |publisher=University of California Press |location=Berkeley |pages=143–147}}</ref>
[[File:Wedding rings.jpg|thumbnail|Wedding rings: commoditycould orbe considered a commodity, pure gift?, or both.]]
Rather than emphasize how particular kinds of objects are either gifts or commodities to be traded in '''restricted''' spheres of exchange, [[Arjun Appadurai]] and others began to look at how objects flowed between these spheres of exchange (i.e. how objects can be converted into gifts and then back into commodities). They refocussed attention away from the character of the human relationships formed through exchange, and placed it on "the social life of things" instead. They examined the strategies by which an object could be "[[commodity pathway diversion|singularized]]" (made unique, special, one-of-a-kind) and so withdrawn from the market. A marriage ceremony that transforms a purchased ring into an irreplaceable family heirloom is one example; the heirloom, in turn, makes a perfect gift. Singularization is the reverse of the seemingly irresistible process of commodification. They thus show how all economies are a constant flow of material objects that enter and leave specific exchange spheres. A similar approach is taken by Nicholas Thomas, who examines the same range of cultures and the anthropologists who write on them, and redirects attention to the "entangled objects" and their roles as both gifts and commodities.<ref>{{cite book |last=Thomas |first=Nicholas |title=Entangled Objects: Exchange, Material Culture, and Colonialism in the Pacific |year=1991 |publisher=Harvard University Press |location=Cambridge, MA}}</ref>
{{main|Moka exchange}}
[[File:Papua New Guinea map.png|thumbnail|[[Mount Hagen]], Papua New Guinea]]
The ''Moka'' is a highly ritualized system of exchange in the [[Mount Hagen]] area, of [[Papua New Guinea]], that has become emblematic of the anthropological concepts of a "gift economy" and of a "[[Big man (anthropology)|big man]]" political system. Moka are reciprocal gifts that raise the social status of the giver if the gift is larger than one that the giver received. ''Moka'' refers specifically to the increment in the size of the gift.<ref>{{cite book|last=Gregory|first=C.A.|title=Gifts and Commodities|publisher=Academic Press|year=1982|location=London|pages=53}}</ref> The gifts are of a limited range of goods, primarily pigs and scarce pearl shells from the coast. To return the same value as one has received in a moka is simply to repay a debt, strict reciprocity. Moka is the extra. To some, this represents interest on an investment. However, one is not bound to provide moka, only to repay the debt. One adds moka to the gift to increase one's prestige, and to place the receiver in debt. It is this constant renewal of the debt relationship which keeps the relationship alive; a debt fully paid off ends further interaction. Giving more than one receives establishes a reputation as a Big man, whereas the simple repayment of debt, or failure to fully repay, pushes one's reputation towards the other end of the scale, "rubbish man".<ref>{{cite book |last=Gregory |first=C.A. |title=Gifts and Commodities |year=1982 |publisher=Academic Press |location=London |pages=53–54}}</ref> Gift exchange thus has a political effect; granting prestige or status to one, and a sense of debt in the other. A political system can be built out of these kinds of status relationships. Sahlins characterizes the difference between status and rank by highlighting that Big man is not a role; it is a status that is shared by many. The Big man is "not a prince ''of'' men", but a "prince among men". The "big man" system is based on the ability to persuade, rather than command.<ref>{{cite journal |last=Sahlins |first=Marshall |title=Poor Man, Rich Man, Big-Man, Chief: Political Types in Melanesia and Polynesia |journal=Comparative Studies in Society and History |year=1963 |volume=5 |issue=3 |series=3 |pages=294–297 |doi=10.1017/s0010417500001729|s2cid=145254059 |doi-access=free }}</ref>
=== Toraja funerals: the politics of meat distribution ===
[[File:Toraja house.jpg|thumb|right|Three ''tongkonan'' noble houses in a Torajan village]]
[[File:Tana Toraja, Salu funeral (6823105668).jpg|thumbnail|Ritual slaughterSlaughter of gift cattleswine at a funeral]]
The [[Toraja]] are an [[ethnic group]] [[indigenous people|indigenous]] to a mountainous region of [[South Sulawesi]], Indonesia.<ref name="official">{{cite web |url=http://www.toraja.go.id/sosial.php |title=Tana Toraja official website |access-date=2006-10-04 |language=id |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20060529201932/http://www.toraja.go.id/sosial.php |archive-date=May 29, 2006 |url-status=dead}}</ref> Torajans are renowned for their elaborate funeral rites, burial sites carved into rocky cliffs, and massive peaked-roof traditional houses known as ''[[tongkonan]]'' which are owned by noble families. Membership in a tongkonan is inherited by all descendants of its founders. Thus any individual may be a member of numerous tongkonan, as long as they contribute to its ritual events. Membership in a tongkonan carries benefits, such as the right to rent some of its rice fields.<ref name="Schrauwers8386">{{cite journal |last=Schrauwers |first=Albert |title=H(h)ouses, E(e)states and class; On the importance of capitals in central Sulawesi |journal=Bijdragen tot de Taal-, Land- en Volkenkunde |year=2004 |volume=160 |issue=1 |pages=83–86 |doi=10.1163/22134379-90003735|s2cid=128968473 |doi-access=free }}</ref>
== Charity and alms giving ==
{{main|Alms}}
Anthropologist [[David Graeber]] argued that the great world religious traditions of charity and gift giving emerged almost simultaneously during the "[[Axial ageAge]]" (800 to 200 BCE), when coinage was invented and market economies were established on a continental basis. Graeber argues that these charity traditions emerged as a reaction against the nexus formed by coinage, slavery, military violence and the market (a "military-coinage" complex). The new world religions, including [[Hinduism]], [[Judaism]], [[Buddhism]], [[Confucianism]], [[Christianity]], and [[Islam]] all sought to preserve "human economies" where money served to cement social relationships rather than purchase things (including people).<ref>{{cite book |last=Graeber |first=David |title=Debt: The first 5,000 years |url=https://archive.org/details/debtfirst5000yea00grae |url-access=registration |year=2011 |publisher=Melville House |location=New York |pages=[https://archive.org/details/debtfirst5000yea00grae/page/223 223–249]|isbn=978-1933633862 }}</ref>
Charity and alms-giving are religiously sanctioned voluntary gifts given without expectation of return. However, case studies show that such gifting is not necessarily altruistic.<ref>{{cite journal |last=Bowie |first=Katherine |title=The Alchemy of Charity: Of class and Buddhism in Northern Thailand |journal=American Anthropologist |year=1998 |volume=100 |issue=2 |pages=469–481 |doi=10.1525/aa.1998.100.2.469}}</ref>
[[File:"YOUR BLOOD CAN SAVE HIM" - NARA - 516245.tif|thumbnail|Blood donation poster, WWII]]
{{main|Organ gifting}}
Market economies tend to "reduce everything – including human beings, their labor, and their reproductive capacity – to the status of commodities".<ref>{{cite web |url=http://commdocs.house.gov/committees/intlrel/hfa73452.000/hfa73452_0.htm#57 |title=Organs For Sale: China's Growing Trade and Ultimate Violation of Prisoners' Rights |author=<!--Not stated--> |date=June 27, 2001 |website=<!--Not stated--> |publisher=<!--Not stated--> |access-date=February 12, 2019 }}</ref> "The rapid transfer of organ transplant technology to the third world has created a trade in organs, with sick bodies travelling to the [[Global South]] for transplants, and healthy organs from the Global South being transported to the richer Global North, "creating a kind of 'Kula ring' of bodies and body parts."<ref>{{cite journal |last=Schepper-Hughes |first=Nancy |title=The Global Traffic in Human Organs |journal=Current Anthropology |year=2000 |volume=41 |issue=2 |pages=193 |doi=10.1086/300123|s2cid=23897844 |url=http://www.escholarship.org/uc/item/0fm776vf }}</ref> However, all commodities can also be singularized, or de-commodified, and transformed into gifts. In North America, it is illegal to sell organs, and citizens are enjoined to give the "gift of life" and donate their organs in an organ gift economy.<ref name="Schepper-Hughes 2000 191–224">{{cite journal |last=Schepper-Hughes |first=Nancy |title=The Global Traffic in Human Organs |journal=Current Anthropology |year=2000 |volume=41 |issue=2 |pages=191–224 |doi=10.1086/300123|pmid=10702141 |s2cid=23897844 |url=http://www.escholarship.org/uc/item/0fm776vf }}</ref> However, this gift economy is a "medical realm rife with potent forms of mystified commodification".<ref>{{cite journal |last=Sharp |first=Lesley A. |title=The Commodification of the Body and its Parts |journal=Annual Review of Anthropology |year=2000 |volume=29 |page=303 |doi=10.1146/annurev.anthro.29.1.287|pmid=15977341 }}</ref> This multimillion-dollar medical industry requires clients to pay steep fees for the gifted organ, which creates clear class divisions between those who donate (often in the global south) and will never benefit from gifted organs, and those who can pay the fees and thereby receive a gifted organ.<ref name="Schepper-Hughes 2000 191–224" />
Unlike body organs, blood and semen have been successfully and legally commodified in the United States. Blood and semen can thus be commodified, but once consumed are "the gift of life". Although both can be either donated or sold, are perceived as the "gift of life" yet are stored in "banks", and can be collected only under strict government regulated procedures, recipients very clearly prefer altruistically donated semen and blood. The blood and semen samples with the highest market value are those that have been altruistically donated. The recipients view semen as storing the potential characteristics of their unborn child in its DNA, and value altruism over greed.<ref>{{cite journal |last=Tober |first=Diane M. |title=Semen as Gift, Semen as Goods: Reproductive Workers and the Market in Altruism |journal=Body & Society |year=2001 |volume=7 |issue=2–3 |pages=137–160 |doi=10.1177/1357034x0100700205|s2cid=145687310 }}</ref> Similarly, gifted blood is the archetype of a pure gift relationship because the donor is only motivated by a desire to help others.<ref>{{cite book |last=Titmuss |first=Richard |title=The Gift Relationship: From human blood to social policy |year=1997 |publisher=The New Press |location=New York}}</ref><ref>Silvestri P., [https://mimesisjournals.com/ojs/index.php/tcrs/article/view/277/223 “The All too Human Welfare State. Freedom Between Gift and Corruption”, Teoria e critica della regolazione sociale, 2/2019, pp. 123–145]. DOI: https://doi.org/10.7413/19705476007</ref>
{{main|Free content}}
Free content, or free information, is any kind of functional work, [[Work of art|artwork]], or other creative [[Content (media and publishing)|content]] that meets the definition of a [[Definition of Free Cultural Works|free cultural work]].<ref>{{Cite web|url=http://freedomdefined.org/Definition|title=Definition of Free Cultural Works|website=freedomdefined.org|access-date=2019-05-02}}</ref> A free cultural work is one which has no significant [[legal]] restriction on people's freedom:
* toTo use the content and benefit from using it,
* toTo study the content and apply what is learned,
* toTo make and distribute copies of the content,
* toTo change and improve the content and distribute these derivative works.<ref>{{cite web |url=http://freedomdefined.org/Definition |title=Definition of Free Cultural Works |access-date=8 December 2011}}</ref><ref>{{cite web |url=https://www.gnu.org/philosophy/free-doc.html |title=Free Software and Free Manuals |access-date=March 22, 2009 |last=Stallman |first=Richard |author-link=Richard Stallman |date=November 13, 2008 |publisher=[[Free Software Foundation]]}}</ref>
Although different definitions are used, free content is legally similar if not identical to [[open content]]. An analogy is the use of the rival terms [[alternative terms for free software|free software and open source]] which describe ideological differences rather than legal ones.<ref>{{cite web |url=https://www.gnu.org/philosophy/open-source-misses-the-point.html |title=Why Open Source misses the point of Free Software |last=Stallman |first=Richard |author-link=Richard Stallman |publisher=[[Free Software Foundation]]}}</ref> Free content encompasses all works in the [[public domain]] and also those [[copyright]]ed works whose [[license]]s honor and uphold the freedoms mentioned above. Because copyright law in most countries by default grants copyright holders [[monopoly|monopolistic control]] over their creations, copyright content must be explicitly declared free, usually by the referencing or inclusion of licensing statements from within the work.
* [[Brownie points]]
* [[Calculation in kind]]
* [[Cargo cult]]
* [[Digital currency]]
* [[Eidi (gift)]]
* [[Egoboo]]
* [[Food swap]]
* [[Free education]]
* [[Giving circles]]
* [[Gratitude trap]]
* [[History of money]]
* [[Homestay]] – [[CouchSurfing]]
* [[Post-scarcity economy]]
* [[Primitive communism]]
* [[Red envelope]]
* [[Round of drinks]]
* [[Solidarity economy]]
* [[World currency]]
* [[Sharing economy]]
{{div col end}}
* ''Cradle of Saturn'' (1999) and its sequel ''The Anguished Dawn'' (2003) by James P. Hogan describe a colonization effort on [[Saturn]]'s largest satellite. Both describe the challenges involved in adopting a new economic paradigm.
* [[Science fiction]] author [[Bruce Sterling]] wrote a story, ''Maneki-neko'', in which the cat-paw gesture is the sign of a secret AI-based gift economy.
* [http://www.gift-economy.com/ The Gift Economy. Writings and videos of Genevieve Vaughan and associated scholars.]
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