Godoy and Cárdenas - Markets and Health of Indigenous People: A Methodological Contribution

Godoy and Cárdenas conducted a study on Mojeña Indians and Yuracarè to determine whether they could find a standpoint on the debate between the effects of markets and acculturation hurt, help, or produce ambiguous effects on the health of indigenous people as they integrate themselves into market economies.

The three positions that most scholars take are:

• Negative - "markets undermine the health of indigenous people because it leads to the introduction of new diseases and changes in diet,work patterns, and subsistence practices; loss of land and natural resources and a reduction in the biological and ecological complexity of the environments"
• Positive - "greater participation increases health because it raises income and education, thereby allowing households to buy modern medical services and improve their nutrition and hygiene"
  
• Ambiguous - "the morbidity of indigenous people may change over time and may vary depending on the degree and nature of a person's integration to the market"

Godoy explains that there are several reasons for the divergent views on this topic. An example is that isoloated poorer villagers may be more willing to work even when they are ill and more likely to underreport feeling ill - with higher income and greater paricipation in the market health, expectations rise and people are more likely to report illness and seek treatment. One of the major reasons for ambiguity though, may be attributed to the failure to distinguish between acculturation and integration when studying morbidity on variables. Godoy asserts that though related, acculturation and integration do not overlap in full and can be defined in different ways - thereby bearing a different relation to morbidity.

The study:
The Mojeña and Yuracarè are among the largest lowland indigenous groups in Bolivia - and contain more variance in socioeconomic attributes than the smaller groups.

Market integration was measure in nine different ways: 1) share of rice sold, 2) share of maize sold, 3) wage labor, 4) use of credit 5) use of chemicals in farming 6) use of a modern rice seeders, 7) village-to-town distance, 8) number of government and non-government institutions in the village, and 9) number of teachers and health in workers in the village

Conclusions:
Godoy and Cárdenas found that the relation between markets and health to be nonlinear and complex . They conclude that though their evidence suggests that the definition of integration to the nonvillage economoy matters, that "irrespective of how integration to the market is defined, markets seems to have little effect on health, after controlling for a broad range of socioeconomic covariates."

Godoy, Ricardo and Marina Cardenas. 2000 Markets and the Health of Indigenous People: A Methodological
Contribution. Human Organization 59(1):117-125.