"Social Freedom" in the Twenty-First Century: Rereading Polanyi. Issue 4 (2nd October 2017)

• Record Type: Journal Article
• Authors: Cangiani, Michele
• Is Part Of: Journal of economic issues. Volume 51:Issue 4(2017)
• Page Start: 915
• Page End: 938
• Publication Date: 2017-10-02
• Subjects: comparative analysis -- freedom in a complex society -- institutional method -- Karl Polanyi -- market society -- Poor Law; A14 -- B15 -- B40 -- H40 -- P16; Economics -- Periodicals; Economics; Économie politique -- Périodiques; Economie; ECONOMICS; ECONOMIC POLICY; Periodicals; 330.05
• DOI: 10.1080/00213624.2017.1391565
• Languages: English
• ISSNs: 0021-3624

Abstract

Abstract: Karl Polanyi's analysis of the genesis, crises, and institutional transformations of contemporary society is grounded on a theory of the basic features and dynamics of capitalism as a peculiar form of society. This article intends to develop this thesis on the basis of a reading of Polanyi's The Great Transformation, with references to Polanyi's preceding and later research. Polanyi's theoretical and methodological achievements suggest a wide comparative outlook and offer a critique of economics, in addition to being deeply connected with his political philosophy. Polanyi's approach seems to be nearer to the original institutional thought — from Karl Marx to Thorstein Veblen, from Max Weber to Adolf Löwe and Karl William Kapp — than to current neo-institutional tendencies in economics, sociology, and historiography. The hard problems society presently faces suggest the need to adhere to Polanyi's radical point of view — that is, to a radical approach to Polanyi's thought.