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With Detroit as its principal site, this essay examines the possibility and the hope for developing a decolonial practice as part of the research in and of a "Black" city. What can we learn from Detroit and what needs to change about ethnography in order for this kind of learning to take place? Can ethnography become a decolonial form or must it be undone and re-emerge as a different kind of intervention in order to effectively contribute to a decolonizing practice? Who should be the interlocutors? Who should be the authors? To what extent must we reimagine the audience? How must ethnography's practitioners reconfigure processes of collaboration in order to effectively change the form? [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In this article I examine the new forms of citizenship that have resulted from the connections between the emergence of new corporate ethics (including fair trade) and outsourcing. The process I call "supply-chain citizenship" is based on a collection of long-distance promises of care that are economically and politically backed by transnational corporations. I analyze the trend toward what the New York Times recently called "activi[st]-capitalism" and how this move is changing relationships between corporations and consumers and consumers and people working along global corporate supply chains. This study builds on my previous research on workers' bodies, citizenship, and sovereignty, now examined along global corporate supply axes. I observe the kinds of political mobilization that are coming into being as the result of links between corporate governance, negotiations between corporate and nation-state sovereignty, and the related setting and enforcement of global labor and environmental standards. In my investigation, I trace ethnical production from design houses to factory floors, from showrooms to department stores, and from NGO monitoring agencies to consumer protest networks. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The introduction to this special issue of Current Anthropology calls for more anthropological attention to how the corporate form shapes and is shaped by daily life. It also traces anthropologists' engagements with corporations over time. We present transformations in traditionally corporate arenas, such as mining and textile production, alongside parallel developments in transnational cooperatives, organic production systems, and ethnic deployments of the corporate form. We consider corporate influence in unexpected sectors, from conservation to poverty alleviation to cancer survival. Furthermore, we analyze corporate norms and practices in relation to broader governance trends, from fair-trade dynamics to shareholder activism and from corporate social responsibility initiatives to the spread of accountability measures and the impact of corporate sovereignty. This issue brings together the voices of anthropologists, social activists, NGO managers, corporate executives, financial planners, and entrepreneurs. It is the product of a 5-day international symposium held in August 2008 at the School for Advanced Research (SAR) campus in Santa Fe, sponsored by both SAR and the Wenner-Gren Foundation. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]