I noticed that something like chains of debt were commonplace. Each migrant made and received loans (including traders' credit). If a man came into a windfall — a stolen wallet or a back-dated pay rise — he was as likely to lend the money as to pay off existing debts. This meant that when he was being dunned by a creditor, he could pass on the pressure to one of his debtors. There is an analogy with traditional bridewealth transactions where in-laws typically chase an infinitely regressive chain of debt in order to retrieve an outstanding cow. Another metaphor for this process, besides that of a chain, might be the ripples caused by a stone dropped into a pool.

XREF: Connects to general economic anthropology on debt and obligation networks, and to Mauss's gift-exchange theory.

Diego Gambetta, Trust - Making and Breaking…, loc. 2329