Economic sociology as public sociology
JEL classification: A14 sociology of economics
Key Words: economic sociology • markets
Public sociology and economic sociology: introductory remarks
Cornell University, Ithaca, NY, USA
Correspondence: rs328{at}cornell.edu
Confronting Market Fundamentalism: doing ‘Public Economic Sociology’
Department of Sociology, University of California, Davis, CA, USA
Correspondence: flblock{at}ucdavis.edu
This essay argues that Market Fundamentalism—a vastly exaggerated belief in the ability of self regulating markets to solve problems—has become hegemonic in the USA. While it is urgent that sociologists challenge these ideas, they are unlikely to be effective if they confine their efforts to writing articles and books. It is necessary to think strategically and work in concert with political allies to wage campaigns that will challenge Market Fundamentalism directly. The example of a campaign to strengthen the position of employees in the hotel and convention industry is used to suggest the kinds of alliances that are necessary.
The invisible science of the invisible hand: the public presence of economic sociology in the USA
University of California, San Diego, CA, USA
Correspondence: aronatas{at}ucsd.edu
In the USA, the public visibility of economic sociology (ES) has been abysmal, especially in contrast to economics. We start with two case studies where economists borrowed ideas from sociologists, executed them at not particularly high levels and still received great publicity. Once we established that economics gets better press even with less original and overall weaker scholarship, we bracket issues of content and proceed to observe other, institutional mechanisms that privilege economists. As economic sociologists receive less notice because they are sociologists and not economists, we analyse the wider discipline of sociology. We find that sociology is more fragmented both as a discipline and as a profession, it has lost many of its outside constituencies by the 1980s, has not developed a mediating layer of journalists, works on a longer time-scale, and has had mixed success in education. We conclude with recommendations how ES can increase its profile in the USA.
Public sociology vs. the market1
University of California, Berkeley, CA, USA
Correspondence: burawoy{at}berkeley.edu
Building on Karl Polanyi's theory of a societal reaction to the unregulated exchange of what he called fictitious commodities—labour, money and land—this paper links the history of sociology to the history of the market. If the first wave of marketization in the nineteenth century dwelt on the commodification of labour, prompting utopian sociologies, and the second wave of marketization of the twentieth century was provoked by the commodification of money, generating national policy sociologies, then the third wave of marketization that began in the last quarter of the twentieth century includes the commodification of the environment (land, air, water), and calls for public sociologies of a global dimension.