A Ghanaian scholar of religion argues that poverty is a particularly complex subject in traditional African cultures, where holistic worldviews unite life s material and spiritual dimensions. A South African ethicist examines informal economies in Ghana, Jamaica, Kenya, and South Africa, looking at their ideological roots, social organization, and vulnerability to global capital. African American theologians offer ethnographic accounts of empowering religious rituals performed in churches in the United States, Jamaica, and South Africa. This important collection brings together these and...

A Ghanaian scholar of religion argues that poverty is a particularly complex subject in traditional African cultures, where holistic worldviews unite life s material and spiritual dimensions. A South African ethicist examines informal economies in Ghana, Jamaica, Kenya, and South Africa, looking at their ideological roots, social organization, and vulnerability to global capital. African American theologians offer ethnographic accounts of empowering religious rituals performed in churches in the United States, Jamaica, and South Africa. This important collection brings together these and...

In the late 20th century, the world has grown increasingly smaller because of advances in technology and the erosion of the nation-state as a political paradigm. The process of globalization-with its promises of a common culture, a common currency, and a common government-offers a new political model for the world that fosters unity and community.
At the same time, however, this process threatens to destroy the values, norms, and ideals that particular cultures have wrought and established and to thereby diminish the power of each culture's unique identity. As globalization occurs,...