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Although I agree with Perelman's recommendation of 'The Great  
Transformation', I object to Polanyi's main thesis. Polanyi (and Perelman)  
might be right that there was no market society in ancient times (or, in  
Polanyi's own terms, that the economy used to be embedded), but that  
doesn't imply that the economy has become disembedded ever since, as  
Polanyi argues. The question is if the transformation of the ancient into  
the modern economy is so great indeed. It is more convincing to state that  
whereas even in ancient times market forces played a role, the  
embeddedness of the economy didn't disappear in modern times (as Mark  
Granovetters 1985 article suggests): there is no need to argue that even  
nowadays, the economy is not isolated from the rest of society. Therefore,  
Polanyi's dichotomy embedded-disembedded seems to be too severe, just like  
the gemeinschaft-gesellschaft dichotomy that is used by the sociologists  
Polanyi refers to (Toennies, Maine) - in that respect, the two dichotomies  
are perfectly congruent. 
 
Olav Velthuis 
Erasmus University Rotterdam 
Faculty of Cultural Studies 
 
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