The history of the development of capitalism in the West, and of the organization of the economic system consequent upon it, evidences the progressive predominance of the market over other institutions. As well as being the chief mechanism for the regulation of economic activity, the market is conventionally regarded as an institution whose laws have come to permeate broad areas of social life, supplanting the norms produced by the state and the community. In short, when we think of the growth of capitalism, we often think of the penetration of the market – and of the principles of competition and exchange on which it is based – into economic and social relationships which were previously governed by other principles, notably solidarity and hierarchy or authority.

The founders of the social sciences based various of the themes most central to their thought on this vision of the market. Suffice it to mention Weber, who ascribed great importance to the principle of rationality, which arose from the necessity for calculation and predictability imposed by the market, and which also came to dominate social life and the political system by embodying itself in the bureaucracy. Or Durkheim, for whom the demise of ‘mechanical solidarity’ and the rise of ‘organic solidarity’ was based on the division of labour, and hence on exchange – the predominant criterion for the allocation of resources in the market. Or Marx, for whom capitalism reduced the relationships among individuals to market relationships tout court and labour to a commodity, to a ‘labour force’ which was demanded and supplied on a market, the labour market.