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The Great Transformation by Karl Polanyi
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The Great Transformation

The Political and Economic Origins of Our Time

The Political and Economic Origins of Our Time

The Political and Economic Origins of Our Time

By Karl Polanyi

By Karl Polanyi

By Karl Polanyi

By Karl Polanyi

By Karl Polanyi

By Karl Polanyi

Best Seller

Part of Beacon Classics

Paperback $26.00

Mar 28, 2001 | ISBN 9780807056431

Hardcover $24.00

Jul 08, 2025 | ISBN 9780807018828

Ebook $18.99

Mar 28, 2001 | ISBN 9780807056424

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    The Great Transformation by Karl Polanyi
    Paperback $26.00
    Mar 28, 2001 | ISBN 9780807056431

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    • $26.00

      Mar 28, 2001 | ISBN 9780807056431

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    • $24.00

      Jul 08, 2025 | ISBN 9780807018828

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    About The Great Transformation

    In this classic work of economic history and social theory, Karl Polanyi analyzes the economic and social changes brought about by the “great transformation” of the Industrial Revolution. His analysis explains not only the deficiencies of the self-regulating market, but the potentially dire social consequences of untempered market capitalism. New introductory material reveals the renewed importance of Polanyi’s seminal analysis in an era of globalization and free trade.

    About The Great Transformation

    One of the twentieth century’s most important pieces of social and economic theory, highlighting the rise and reality of capitalism as it shaped our world

    A limited Beacon Classics edition

    In this classic work of economic history and social theory, Karl Polanyi tracks the economic and social changes brought about by the “great transformation” of the Industrial Revolution. He pays particular attention to capitalism’s rise and its role in fundamentally altering life after the Industrial Revolution. While previous economic arrangements were embedded within social relations, capitalism reverses this: social relations are defined by economic relations. This seminal analysis explains not only the deficiencies of the self-regulating market, but the potentially dire social consequences of untempered market capitalism.

    In an era of ever-increasing globalization and free trade, Polanyi’s cogent historical, social, and economic analysis offers grounded insight into the inner workings of the modern world. Polanyi suggests that capitalism is a historical anomaly. The rules of reciprocity, redistribution and communal obligations were far more consistent as guiding principles of exchange than market relations throughout human history. Capitalism, however, does not exhibit these obligations, and in fact its rise irreversibly destroyed them. The true “great transformation” of the industrial revolution was to completely replace all modes of interaction with capitalism and market relations, forever altering the function, and result, of human relations.

    Now with a new hardcover package, this treatise from one of the greatest thinkers of the 20th century will illuminate seminal economic and social theory for fans old and new.

    About The Great Transformation

    In this classic work of economic history and social theory, Karl Polanyi analyzes the economic and social changes brought about by the “great transformation” of the Industrial Revolution. His analysis explains not only the deficiencies of the self-regulating market, but the potentially dire social consequences of untempered market capitalism. New introductory material reveals the renewed importance of Polanyi’s seminal analysis in an era of globalization and free trade.

    Product Details

    Category: Economics | Domestic Politics | World History

    Paperback | $26.00
    Published by Beacon Press
    Mar 28, 2001 | 360 Pages | 5-1/2 x 8-1/2 | ISBN 9780807056431

    Category: Economics | Domestic Politics | World History

    Hardcover | $24.00
    Published by Beacon Press
    Jul 08, 2025 | 360 Pages | 6 x 9 | ISBN 9780807018828

    Category: Economics | Domestic Politics | World History

    Ebook | $18.99
    Published by Beacon Press
    Mar 28, 2001 | 360 Pages | ISBN 9780807056424

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    Praise

    As the Second World War was drawing to a close in 1944, two great works of political economy were published. One was Hayek’s The Road to Serfdom, the driving force behind the free-market revolution in the final quarter of the twentieth century. The other was Karl Polanyi’s The Great Transformation. . . . [It] is well worth reading. -Larry Elliott, The Guardian

    “[The Great Transformation] did more than any work of that generation to broaden and deepen the critique of market societies.”-John Buell, The Progressive

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