The Market

We have become accustomed to economists and politicians talking about "market forces" as if they are immutable laws of the universe. But what exactly is "the market"? Originally an abstract idea from economic theory - the locus of supply and demand - it has come to inform the way we speak about our relationship to the economic system as a whole. Matthew Watson unpacks the concept to ask what does it really mean to allow ourselves to submit to market forces. And does economic theory really provide insights into the market institutions that shape our everyday life? In tackling these questions, the book provides a major contribution to a deeper appreciation of the dominant economic language of our time, challenging the idea that we can simply defer to the "logic of the market".

Table of Contents:
1. Introduction2. The market concept in triplicate3. Symmetrical moral relationships: Adam Smith's impartial spectator construct4. Demand and supply in partial equilibrium: the Marshallian cross diagram5. Vectors of market-clearing prices: the Walrasian auctioneer6. The political rhetoric of "the market"7. Conclusion

About the Author :
Matthew Watson is Professor of Political Economy in the Department of Politics and International Studies at the University of Warwick. His books include Foundations of International Political Economy (2005), The Political Economy of International Capital Mobility (2007) and Uneconomic Economics and the Crisis of the Model World (2014).

Review :
Watson has provided a history of the economic ideas that form the basis of modern economics, brilliantly explaining where many of the economic laws and concepts central to the idea of the market originated . . . there are very few texts on the market that are as good as this. A masterpiece of erudition and concision, Matthew Watson’s new book lifts the lid on a concept whose ubiquity in public discourse is matched only by its slipperiness. With immense skill, Watson explores the ways in which the idea of 'the market' has developed within the field of economics and in so-doing teases out the complex relationships between academic abstraction of the market concept and the prevalence of market ideology in politics. The result is a truly impressive book that should be regarded as a vital supplement to standard economics textbooks and essential reading for anyone interested in understanding whether there are alternatives to the 'iron cage' of the market. Watson unearths precisely why we feel so comfortable attributing disruptive economic change simply to the will of the market . . . [he] traces the emergence and triumph of the market concept as we know it, deploying critical insights from political economy and undertaking a deeply-textured excavation of the history of economic thought. The Market provides a valuable history of ‘the market’ as an idea, rendering unfamiliar something we often take as a given. In doing so, the book makes a useful contribution to vibrant debates within political economy and feeds into timely conversations beyond academia about our position as economic subjects. At a time when we are increasingly facing pressure to imagine alternative economic futures in which the economy works for everyone, The Market’s call to action will certainly have wide appeal in its abandonment of the present market concept.