Development and the temporality of its exchange. How an Eastern Yucatec village made cash transfer promises accountable

ANDRES DAPUEZ

Antípoda. Revista de Antropología y Arqueología

Departamento de Antropología. Universidad de los Andes.

Lugar: Bogotá; Año: 2016 vol. 26 p. 159 - 177

This paper explores how three temporalitiesof exchange impact the reception of development cash transfers in a village ofEastern Yucatan, Mexico. Based on participant observation and in-depthinterviews with Procampo and Oportunidades cash transfer recipients, thisresearch reveals that ritual promising works as a method of temporal regulationin most cash transfer transactions. Cash transfer recipients hold theirgovernment accountable for cash transfers? promises and commitments. People inthis village qualify the transfers? temporal ranges and their effectiveness and,by alluding to previous stipulations that both sustain exchange and make itunderstandable and bearable as a promise, evaluate Procampo?s and Oportunidades?sobjectives to be implausible. The accountability of these transfers? long-termeffects is not, however, only based on local impressions of a state thatprocrastinates its ?engagement? with village peasants. As the temporalconsecution of human capital also exceeds the limits of responsible promising, cashtransfer programs cannot be evaluated in terms of their fulfilled orunfulfilled promises.