Articles by Thomas A Timberg

Cannibals and Missionaries Thomas A Timberg MUCH comment on SSE units sees them as forming a critical, but transient portion of the industrial structure of developing countries.1 In the earliest stage, small units prevail. Later they are displaced by larger ones. This has been so both in earlier industrialisation, as of the present industrialised countries, as well as the Newly Industrialised Countries (NICs such as Korea, Taiwan, Singapore, etc). Logically, increasing volumes of production enable scale economics, upward pressure and wages, cause the substitution of more capital intensive techniques, etc. Of course, even in the final stage, some small manufacturing units survive, for craft or luxury goods, or dealing in highly specialised items as well as in the forefront of new industries or industrial trends.2 Jane Jacobs, in some recent articles, has emphasised the role of these sectors in retaining an economy's resiliency.3 To the extent that size transformation does not occur, observers worry that a pathology is present. For example, that markets are so protected that inefficient firms are not subject to competitive pressure. Or that the economy is static and experiencing little growth and transformation. Large scale firms, when they are successful, institutionalise continuous change within themselves

Micro and Macro Data in Village India A Note Allan Hoben Thomas A Timberg Despite the complementarity of in-depth participant-observer studies and research based on census and survey techniques, or perhaps because of it, it has proven difficult to develop a fruitful relationship between them. Until recently, differences in intellectual orientation, methodological dogma and philosophical outlook, as well as of institutional affiliation, has tended to keep their practitioners apart and at odds. Over the past few years, the situation has begun to change due to a convergence in theoretical perspectives between economists and anthropologist interested in empirical studies of decision-making and a convergence of their interests, for example in the rural poor. It appears, however, that successful collar boration depends on researchers sharing an interest in the same empirical problems, and probably some explicit co-ordination.