First published in 1944 by Farrar & Rinehart, it deals with the social and political upheavals that took place in England during the rise of the market economy.

[2] It was only after industrialization and the onset of greater state control over newly created market institutions that the myth of human nature's propensity toward rational free trade became widespread.

Central to the change was that factors of production, such as land and labor, would now be sold on the market at market-determined prices instead of allocated according to tradition, redistribution, or reciprocity.

'"[14] According to James Ashley Morrison, Polanyi offers a prominent argument in the field of political economy for Britain's decision to depart from the gold standard.

[15] Polanyi argues that Britain went off the gold standard due to both deteriorating international economic conditions and pressures from labor, which had grown stronger over time.

In 1931, the Labour Party found itself faced with a dire dilemma: either reduce social services or let currency exchange rates collapse.

At the same time, a newly empowered working class harnessed evolving “social purpose” to resist the austerity necessary to defend gold.Based on Bronislaw Malinowski's ethnological work on the Kula ring exchange in the Trobriand Islands, Polanyi makes the distinction between markets as an auxiliary tool for ease of exchange of goods and market societies.

[20] The sociologists Fred L. Block and Margaret Somers argue that Polanyi's analysis could help explain why the resurgence of free market ideas has resulted in "such manifest failures as persistent unemployment, widening inequality, and the severe financial crises that have stressed Western economies over the past forty years."

They suggest that "the ideology that free markets can replace government is just as utopian and dangerous" as the idea that Communism will result in the withering away of the state.

Graeber attacks formalists and substantivists alike: "those who start by looking at society as a whole are left, like the Substantivists, trying to explain how people are motivated to reproduce society; those who start by looking at individual desires, like the formalists, unable to explain why people chose to maximize some things and not others (or otherwise to account for questions of meaning).

"[22] While appreciative of Polanyi's attack on formalism, Graeber attempts to move beyond ethnography and towards understanding how individuals find meaning in their actions, synthesizing insights of Marcel Mauss, Karl Marx, and others.

In parallel with Polanyi's account of markets being made internal to society as a result of state intervention, Graeber argues the transition to credit-based markets from societies with separated "spheres of exchange" in gift giving was likely the accidental byproduct of state or temple bureaucracy (temple in the case of Sumer).

One can only imagine the tensions and temptations that must have existed in a community—and communities, much though they are based on love, in fact, because they are based on love, will always also be full of hatred, rivalry and passion—when it became clear that with sufficiently clever scheming, manipulation, and perhaps a bit of strategic bribery, they could arrange to have almost anyone they hated imprisoned or even hanged.Economist Joseph Stiglitz favors Polanyi's account of market liberalization, arguing that the failures of "Shock Therapy" in Russia and the failures of IMF reform packages echo Polanyi's arguments.

[24] Charles Kindleberger praised the book, saying it "is a useful corrective to the economic interpretation of the world, and should be read more and more by economists, particularly those of the Chicago school."

[29] Both Bregman and Corey Robin credited Polanyi's view with Richard Nixon moving away from a proposed basic income system because Polanyi was heavily quoted in a report by Nixon's aide, Martin Anderson, then ultimately providing arguments for various reductions in the welfare state introduced by Ronald Reagan, Bill Clinton and George W.

[31] Polanyi's account of reciprocity and redistributive systems is inherently changeless and thus cannot explain the emergence of the more specific form of modern capitalism in the 19th century.