Markets are not natural but politically constructed, and disembedding them from social relations provokes protective counter-movements.
Karl Polanyi the economic historian, distinct from Michael Polanyi of Polanyi's paradox. His 1944 double movement predicts that market expansion generates its own protective counter-reaction, which is his explanation for the 1930s.
In practice
- A country liberalises its labour market rapidly and produces, within a decade, the strongest labour protections in its region.
- A city deregulates short-term letting and finds itself with more restrictive rules five years later than it had before.
- Standing
- Karl Polanyi the economic historian, distinct from Michael Polanyi of Polanyi's paradox.
- Subject
- Sociology & Culture
- Essay
- How societies hold together, sort people, and change