Difference between revisions of "Table of Contents"

Each cluster of entries is introduced and concluded by a piece with comparative or conceptual entries, indicated as ‘general’. For example, Chapter 6 on [[gaming the system]] benefits from an [http://discovery.ucl.ac.uk/10041172/1/The-Global-Encyclopaedia-of-Informality-Volume-2.pdf#page=213 introduction] to the strategies of camouflage (by Philip Hanson); general entries identifying patterns common for the cluster such as [[cash-in-hand]] (by Colin Williams), [[brokerage]] (by David Jancsics), [[window dressing]] (by David Leung), and [[pyramid schemes]] (by Leonie Schiffauer); as well as a [http://discovery.ucl.ac.uk/10041172/1/The-Global-Encyclopaedia-of-Informality-Volume-2.pdf#page=341 conclusion] with methodological implications for the study of part- time crime and ‘camouflaged’ activities (by Gerald Mars). The authors of conceptual or reflective pieces offer possible perspectives, thematic links and further research questions in order to help the reader with the uneasy tasks of comparing the incomparable and theorising the practice. Such entries themselves constitute a ‘network expertise’ – a coordinated conceptual framework – aimed at tackling complexity through mastering paradoxes; articulating the unspoken and visualising the invisible; finding patterns in the amorphous and formalising the informal; finding similarities in differences and differences in similarities; comparing the incomparable and doing the undoable. Please note, we do not claim the absolute ubiquity of practices in respective societies. Following Olivier de Sardan’s take on culture, we understand social and cultural complexity as ‘a set of practices and representations that investigation has shown to be shared to a significant degree by a given group (or sub-group), in given fields and in given contexts’ (Olivier de Sardan 2015).