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The exchange of gifts, which represent significant functions in the triangle of human, society and culture, are among the cornerstones of social interaction. Having considered the reciprocity concept in primitive society in light of ethnographic data, Mauss laid down how gift exchange and potlatch culture functions in a self-producing cycle. Self-production is one of the basic concepts of Luhmann. self-production of functional systems is carried out over communication channels. This paper is intended to show and stress the importance of gift exchange within the social system with a focus on its past and current functions. Consequently, principles of exchange defined by Mauss is one of the mechanisms that Luhmann calls as a communication system. In Luhmann's words, principles of gift exchange operate as choice and motivation mechanisms and their meaning are ascribed based on the way choices are made. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Highlights l We model the causes and welfare impacts of the competition of gift giving. l We study gift competition and its impacts by using a unique database in China. l People respond to the average cost of gifts given in their community. l The escalation of gift giving has adverse welfare impacts. l Increasing gift expenditures squeeze spending on other consumption items. Abstract In many developing countries, gift expenses escalate with income growth and account for a substantial share of household expenditure. We develop a theoretical model to demonstrate how (unequal) income growth may trigger "gift competition" and drive up the financial burden associated with gift exchange. We use unique census-type panel data from rural China to test our model predictions and demonstrate that (1) the value of gifts responds to the average gift in the community, (2) the escalation of gift giving may have adverse welfare implications (especially for the poor), and (3) escalating gift expenses crowd out expenditures on other consumption items. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The article deals with the role of gift-giving during the period of the first Hasmoneans. Whereas Mattathias rejected gifts and other grants offered by the Seleucids (and by doing so sharpened the rift between Jews and Seleucids), from Jonathan onwards the Hasmoneans became players within this framework of gifting on the international scene and enter into the complex network of gifting and reciprocity. A distinction between gift, grant and concession is drawn, taking into account various aspects such as valuability (value of gift), status (the social stature of giver and receiver), supplementation (rhetoric that is considered to be part and parcel of gifting in Hellenistic etiquette), as well as compatibility (whether the gift is in proportion to the wealth of the giver and to the occasion it was given). The article concludes with a reference to the possible critical stance of the narrator of 1 Maccabees concerning gifts and gifting adopted by the later Hasmoneans in their relationships with Hellenistic powers. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]

In the modern gift literature an anti-utilitarian and a utilitarian view on the gift can be distinguished. From the anti-utilitarian perspective, the freedom of the gift is seen as one of its main characteristics, while the idea that gifts are caught in a cycle of reciprocity is downplayed. In the utilitarian approach, assumptions about rational actors weighing their preferences according to some utility are predominant. In the first approach, reciprocity is seen as undermining 'genuine' gifts. The utilitarian approach does take reciprocity into account but fails to analyse why the principle of reciprocity is so effective. This article attempts to provide such an explanation. By illuminating both the variety of the forms of the gift and the universality of the underlying principle, it is argued that gifts reflect a multi-purpose symbolic 'utility' that transcends both utilitarianism and anti-utilitarianism. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Ethnographic evidence, empirical research, and results of experimental studies suggest that people across cultures invest in prosocial behavior, but little research addresses the relative importance of personal versus group incentives to invest in prosocial behavior. We estimate the relative weight of personal and group incentives for households to invest in prosocial behavior using two waves of panel data (2001 and 2002)from ca. 350 Tsimane' Amerindians, a foraging-farming society in the Bolivian Amazon. We found that some personal incentives bore a significant association with household decisions to display prosocial behavior. Consistent with previous research, we found that investments in prosocial behavior first rise and then decline with age, and that cash income bore a positive association with investments in prosocial behavior. We found no evidence that group incentives were associated with personal investments in prosocial behavior once we eontrolled for fixed attributes of villages, but those fixed attributes did explain a significant share of the variation in the data. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]