Chapters in this book

1. Frontmatter i
2. Contents vii
3. Preface ix
4. A Rocky Road 1
5. 1 Groups and Violence 5
6. Ethnography and Suspicion 17
7. 2 Social Organization in Istalif 22
8. Making Pots 32
9. 3 How Making Pots Bound People Together 34
10. The Art of Finding a Bargain 50
11. 4 How Selling Pots Tore People Apart 53
12. Telling Stories 73
13. 5 Leadership, Descent, and Marriage 76
14. Dinner 103
15. 6 Cultural Definitions of Power in Istalif 106
16. Election Day 142
17. 7 Masterly Inactivity: The Politics of Stagnation 145
18. The Director of Intelligence 180
19. 8 The Afghan State as a Useful Fiction 182
20. Paktya—Eighteen Months Later 206
21. 9 Thinking About Violence, Social Organization, and International Intervention 208
22. Notes 225
23. Bibliography 239
24. Index 247