Last Thanksgiving, My family and I volunteered our time at a local soup kitchen to give to the people who had no food to eat, no place to eat it, or no family to spend the holiday with. Why did we choose to spend our holiday with complete strangers? Why didn’t we just eat our own meal at home? We chose to be part of a gift economy. According to Wikipedia, “A gift economy is an economic system in which the prevalent mode of exchange is for goods and services to be given without explicit agreement upon a quid pro quo (the Latin term for the concept of "a favor for a favor"). Typically, this occurs in a cultural context where there is an expectation either of reciprocation—in the form of goods or services of comparable value, or of political support, general loyalty, honor to the giver, etc.”
I have been helping at soup kitchens for as long as I can remember. It is such a good feeling to know that I am giving my time to such a great cause. A soup kitchen can be related to many other gift economies. “Even in more anonymous settings, such as Usenet discussion groups, there is a surprising amount of free help and information given out, often to complete strangers whom one may never meet again” (Kollack 1999). Like Usenet, A soup kitchen is open to anyone who needs a meal whether they are known of or not. Both Usenet and Soup kitchens are gift economies because both are offering help to those in need, just to be helpful. The people who come to eat at the soup kitchen don’t do anything for me, and I don’t expect anything back. However, those people who are grateful and thankful for what I have done, really make me think that I am getting something back for doing something good. I also like to think that if I ever needed help in anyway, there would be someone there for me, just to do something nice like I have done for people I have helped.
Kollack mentions the public good, or doing beneficial things to people other than you. “First, it is to some degree indivisible in that one person's consumption of the good does not reduce the amount available to another… Second, a public good is to some degree non-excludable in that it is difficult or impossible to exclude individuals from benefiting from the good” (Kollack 1999). I believe that the soup kitchen is a public good. One person can come to the soup kitchen and have two servings of food, while the person infront and behind him can have the same amount. Also, the soup kitchen is open to anyone in need of a warm meal. It is such a worthwhile cause that benefits all those involved.
I am very glad that I am part of such a helpful gift economy. Doing something nice, just to do something nice is appreciated by so many people around the world.
“We make a living by what we get, but we make a life by what we give.”
-Winston Churchill
Gift economy. (2007, February 4). In Wikipedia, The Free Encyclopedia. Retrieved 21:10, February 8, 2007, from http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Gift_economy&oldid=105681971
Kollock, P, (1999). The Economies of Online Cooperation: Gifts and Public Goods in Cyberspace. University of California, Los Angeles. Retrieved February 8, 2007. http://www.sscnet.ucla.edu/soc/faculty/kollock/papers/economies.htm
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