It reflects an increasing recognition of the centrality of cultural process to the reproduction of inequality and human ill-being among development policy makers and economists. However, we are well aware that economists are newcomers to this field and that anthropology and sociology have made seminal contributions to it for over two centuries. On the other hand, over the last fifty years, economists have been engaged, for better or worse,much more centrally with making policy than the other social sciences. It thus seems obvious that policy would be better served by a cross-disciplinary dialogue among the social sciences?on equal terms?on ?why? and ?how? culture matters for development and the implications of this for public action.