Karl Polanyi and Markets in the Ancient Near East: The Challenge of the Evidence

Abstract

The essay challenges Karl Polanyi's position—that ancient Near Eastern economies knew state and temple administration but not price-making markets. It is found that the prerequisite functions of a market economy listed by Polanyi—the allocation of consumer goods, land, and labor through the supply-demand-price mechanism; risk-bearing organized as a market function; and loan markets—were all present in the ancient Near East. Although Polanyi criticized stage theories with their “predilection for continuity” he imposed his own version of continuity on history in lumping together many thousands of years under the rubric of “archaic society.” This perspective prevented him from recognizing that ancient Mesopotamia experienced lengthy and significant periods of unfettered market activity as well as periods of pervasive state regulation.

Polanyian Reading of the Socio-Economic Transformations of the European Union

“…3 A wide array of empirical evidence has been presented to challenge Polanyi's assertion that the market society is disembedded compared with the fully embedded pre-capitalist societies. Numerous studies have demonstrated the operation of the price-setting mechanism in the medieval period, which in turn shows that disembeddedness cannot be counted as an exclusive feature of the market economy (Latham 1997;Silver 1983). Holmes (2012) has rightly observed that Polanyi has been criticised both for portraying primitive societies as embedded and capitalists as disembedded.…”

‘Marketless Trading in Hammurabi’s Time’: A Re-appraisal

“…63 Of course, by the first millennium the picture had changed markedly --as with money (discussed above). Babylonian fields and gardens in private hands could be freely bought and sold, and by the time of Nabonidus most of the temple's arable land was farmed by sharecroppers and no longer by its own labour 55 Silver (1983) 'Karl Polanyi and Markets in the Ancient Near East,' pp.810-11. 56 Mayhew et al, 1983.…”

Levantine Kingdoms of the Late Bronze Age

“…Market principles were another important aspect of LBA trade. This is shown by the often independent position of individual merchants, their concern for profi t, and their tendency to combine private and offi cial business ventures (Heltzer 1978 ;Silver 1983 ). In addition, the redistributive principle functioned at the level of internal exchange within the Levantine kingdoms, when a surplus of agricultural products was obtained, stored, and administered by the palace (Schloen 2001 : 221 -54).…”