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Fighting on Christmas: brawling as self-governance in rural Peru

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  19 September 2019

Edwar E. Escalante  and
Raymond J. March
Edwar E. Escalante
Affiliation:
Free Market Institute, Texas Tech University, Angelo State University, San Angelo, Texas
Raymond J. March*
Affiliation:
Center for the Study of Public Choice and Private Enterprise, North Dakota State University, Fargo, North Dakota
*
*Corresponding author. Email: [email protected]
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Abstract

This paper analyzes the Peruvian highland tradition of Takanakuy, a public brawling ritual occurring each Christmas to resolve conflicts between local community members. We argue that Takanakuy provides an effective way for locals to resolve disputes that Peru's formal judicial system is unable or unwilling to settle. Using insights from ethnographic fieldwork, journalistic articles, reports, and academic sources, we find that brawling during Takanakuy encourages social cooperation by preventing potential violence and offering community members a credible mechanism of law enforcement in an orderly fashion with social acceptance.

Keywords

Brawlingconflict resolutionself-governanceinstitutional analysis
Type
Research Article
Information
Journal of Institutional Economics , Volume 16 , Issue 3 , June 2020 , pp. 355 - 368
Copyright
Copyright © Millennium Economics Ltd 2019

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