 Karl Polanyi’s Critique of Market LiberalismPeter de Haan Chapter Chapter 4 in Great Economists and the Evolution of Economic Liberalism, 2025, pp 97-121 from Springer Abstract: Abstract This chapter captures Polanyi’s analysis of what market liberalism had brought about since the Industrial Revolution. While rejecting most aspects of liberalism, Polanyi nevertheless passionately defended freedom—a major notion of liberalism. In his magnum opus The Great Transformation, Polanyi laid the limitations of self-regulating markets bare. His principal message was that market liberalism, was doomed to fail and resulted in the political and economic disasters of the Great War, the Great Depression and the rise of fascism and communism. These evil political doctrines were reactions against market liberalism’s inability to satisfy people’s rights. Part II describes the inspiration he got from a variety of philosophers. The Great Transformation is enjoying renewed interest. Polanyi offers a transformative guiding idea that can change social reality. It is in his defence of nonmarket utopia that Polanyi’s legacy lies. The Great Transformation is not just about what went wrong since the Industrial Revolution, but also about what the future could bring in terms of political, economic, and social transformation, now that market liberalism’s failures have again been exposed. Date: 2025 There are no downloads for this item, see the EconPapers FAQ for hints about obtaining it. Related works: Export reference: BibTeX RIS (EndNote, ProCite, RefMan) HTML/Text Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:spr:sprchp:978-3-031-93831-3_4 Ordering information: This item can be ordered from DOI: 10.1007/978-3-031-93831-3_4 Access Statistics for this chapter More chapters in Springer Books from Springer |
Is your work missing from RePEc? Here is how to contribute.
Questions or problems? Check the EconPapers FAQ or send mail to .
EconPapers is hosted by the
School of Business at Örebro University.