Conceptualizing contemporary markets: Introduction to the special issue

Abstract

Contemporary markets are evolving in numerous ways that affect their structure, dynamics and consequences. Yet while the concept of the market is central to comparative, international and global political economy, there exists no concerted body of literature dedicated to debating and articulating different conceptions of the market and that critically self-reflects on how these empirical transformations are intersecting with the central theoretical concerns of political economy: power, contestation and change. This special issue enriches the debate by looking to decentre the concept of the market from its traditional home in mainstream neoclassical/liberal political economy. Western-centric conceptualizations of the market based on a minimal atomistic classical definition have dominated international economic discourses but it is becoming increasingly clear that different understandings of markets and the functions they serve are crystalizing between market stakeholders at the global level. This special issue addresses these concerns via the historicization of the concept of the market, the development and refinement of the concept of the market, as well as the decentring of the concept of the market via empirical studies of global market change informed by an awareness of the political, economic, social and cultural embeddedness of markets. In so doing, the special issue leverages the insights of global political economy and cognate disciplines to achieve richer insights into the analytical potential of the concept of the market.