[
Fred Block ]
Introduction
n eminent economic historian, reviewing the reception and in-
fluence over the years of
The Great Transformation, remarked
that "some books refuse to go away." It is an apt statement. Although
written in the early 1940s, the relevance and importance of Karl Pola-
nyi's work has continued to grow. Although few books these days have
a shelf life of more than a few months or years, after more than a half a
century
The Great Transformation remains fresh in many ways. In-
deed, it is indispensable for understanding the dilemmas facing global
society at the beginning of the twenty-first century.
There is a good explanation for this durability.
The Great Transfor-
mation provides the most powerful critique yet produced of market
liberalism—the belief that both national societies and the global
economy can and should be organized through self-regulating mar-
kets. Since the 1980s, and particularly with the end of the Cold War in
the early 1990s, this doctrine of market liberalism—under the labels of
Thatcherism, Reaganism, neoliberalism, and "the Washington Con-
I have incurred significant debts in preparing this introduction. The greatest is to
Kari Polanyi Levitt, who provided extensive and detailed comments, both substantive
and editorial, on several drafts of the introduction. It has been a rare privilege to work
with her. Michael Flota, Miriam Joffe-Block, Marguerite Mendell, and Margaret Som-
ers also gave me valuable feedback. Margaret Somers has helped me to understand
Polanyi's thought for close to thirty years; much of what I have written reflects her
thinking. In addition, Michael Flota provided assistance in the preparation of the in-
troduction and in the larger task of preparing this new edition.
I also owe a considerable debt to Kari Polanyi Levitt and Marguerite Mendell in
their roles as the co -directors of the Karl Polanyi Institute of Political Economy, located
at Concordia University in Montreal, Quebec. My understanding of Polanyi's thought
has been deeply shaped by their collegiality and by the archive they maintain of Pola-
nyi's papers. Readers who want to learn more about Polanyi's thought and the interna-
tional community of scholars working in this tradition should contact the Karl Polanyi
Institute and consult the important series of books,
Critical Perspectives on Historic Is-
sues, published with Black Rose Press in Montreal.
[
xviii ]
X
Introduction [ xix ]
sensus"—has come to dominate global politics. But shortly after the
work was first published in 1944, the Cold War between the United
States and the Soviet Union intensified, obscuring the importance of
Polanyi's contribution. In the highly polarized debates between the
defenders of capitalism and the defenders of Soviet-style socialism,
there was little room for Polanyi's nuanced and complex arguments.
Hence there is a certain justice that with the ending of the Cold War
era, Polanyi's work is beginning to gain the visibility it deserves.
The core debate of this post-Cold War period has been over global-
ization. Neoliberals have insisted that the new technologies of com-
munications and transportation make it both inevitable and desirable
that the world economy be tightly integrated through expanded trade
and capital flows and the acceptance of the Anglo-American model of
free market capitalism. A variety of movements and theorists around
the world have attacked this vision of globalization from different po-
litical perspectives—some resisting on the basis of ethnic, religious,
national, or regional identities; others upholding alternative visions of
global coordination and cooperation. Those on all sides of the debate
have much to learn from reading
The Great Transformation; both neo-
liberals and their critics will obtain a deeper grasp of the history of
market liberalism and an understanding of the tragic consequences of
earlier projects of economic globalization.
Polanyi's Life and Work
Karl Polanyi (1886-1964) was raised in Budapest, in a family re-
markable for its social engagement and intellectual achievements.
1
His brother Michael became an important philosopher of science
whose work is still widely read. Polanyi himself had been an influen-
tial personality in Hungarian student and intellectual circles before
World War I. In Vienna, in the 1920s, Polanyi worked as a senior editor
1. A full biography of Polanyi does not yet exist, but much of the relevant material
is covered in Marguerite Mendell and Kari Polanyi Levitt, "Karl Polanyi—His Life and
Times" Studies in Political Economy, no. 22 (spring 1987): 7-39. See also Levitt, ed.,
Life
and Work of Karl Polanyi (Montreal: Black Rose Press, 1990); and her essay, "Karl Pola-
nyi as Socialist," in Kenneth McRobbie, ed.,
Humanity, Society, and Commitment: On
Karl Polanyi (Montreal: Black Rose Press, 1994). Extensive biographical material is also
available in Kenneth McRobbie and Kari Polanyi Levitt, eds.,
Karl Polanyi in Vienna
(Montreal: BlackRose Press, 2000). Peter Drucker, the management theorist who knew
the Polanyi family in Vienna, has written an amusing account in his memoir
Adven-
tures of a Bystander (New York: John Wiley, 1994), but many of the specific facts—in-
cluding some of the names of Polanyi's siblings—are inaccurate.