Tauutuutu is more than reciprocity
Tauutuutu describes reciprocal exchange with obligation, balance and return through time. For impact work, it changes the question from who received value to how value travelled, returned and strengthened future capacity.
The idea
By Dr Jay Whitehead ·
Tauutuutu · Reciprocity · Value transmission
Tauutuutu is often translated simply as reciprocity. That is a useful opening, but it can flatten a richer economic idea: exchange is held within relationships, obligations continue through time, and value may return in a different form or to a different part of the network.
For impact analysis, this matters because a linear account can miss what happens after a direct outcome. Capability may be shared. Support may return. Hosting may renew relationships that later carry resources, care or opportunity. The relevant unit is not always one person receiving one benefit once.
Tauutuutu does not license an assumption that every benefit multiplies. It provides a reason to look for return pathways and reinforcing effects, then test them. Where evidence shows only a direct change, the account should stop there. Where return and transmission are visible, the model should not assume they are worth nothing.
Sources and further reading
A contribution to discussion
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