Economic sociology and market problems

Abstract

This paper deals with some recent contributions to economic sociology as the sociological discipline, however, it focuses on the problem of the market which takes the central position within this discipline. Therefore, it first discusses the position of economic sociology within the differentiated field of sociology and interprets the authors who have contributed the most to the establishment, development and affi rmation of economic sociology (Weber, Polanyi, Schumpeter, Parsons, Swedberg, Granovetter, Bourdieu, etc.). However, their understanding of the market is emphasized throughout. The paper then explains new (“postclassical”) trends of the formation and function of economic sociology (“new economic sociology”) and interprets various approaches to the market (relation between market and non-market sphere, market and state, market and organization, etc.). The paper, based on this discussion, argues that the market is, regardless of its extremely ambivalent and contradictory status in sociological and more general theoretical thought, inevitable empirical and theoretical fact of the modern world and that the overlapping of economy and sociology in its understanding is an important element of modern social science, especially sociology.