Commodities, Commodity Fetishism, and Commodification

Sammond, Nicholas

doi:10.1002/9781405165518.wbeosc074

Cited by 5 publications

(3 citation statements)

References 6 publications

Supporting

Mentioning

Contrasting

Order By: Relevance

“…The commodity concept provides a cornerstone of modern economics, beginning with Adam Smith, David Ricardo and Karl Marx who defined it as a value-bearing product to be sold and bought in the market (Sammond 2007). While Polanyi takes up these theoretical strands in TGT, he draws a distinction between genuine and fictitious commodities: whereas the former are conceived as "objects [i. e. goods and services] produced for sale on the market" (Polanyi 2001, p. 75), the latter are not produced for market sale.…”

Section: Double Movements Around Fictitious Commoditiesmentioning

confidence: 99%

Commodity Studies with Polanyi: Disembedding and Re-Embedding Labour and Land in Contemporary Capitalism

Langthaler¹,

Schüßler²

2019

Österreich Z Soziol

View full text Add to dashboard Cite

This article aims to inform current debates in the field of transnational commodity studies through a Polanyian lens. Polanyi reminds us of the need to pay attention to the "double movements" in which fictitious commodities are disembedded from and re-embedded in society. We focus on two fictitious commodities, labour and land, which are conventionally treated as mere inputs for the production of genuine commodities. Through investigating the disembedding and re-embedding of labour in the garment industry, and of land in the agro-food sector since the 1970s, we gain insights regarding the commodification of fictitious commodities in the context of transnational commodity chains. The developments in both fields imply not just simple double movements, but complex entanglements of disembedding and reembedding dynamics at the interface of state, business and civil society actors. Keywords Fictitious commodities • Commodity chains • Global production networks • Garment industry • Agro-food industry Warenstudien mit Polanyi: Entbettung und Wiedereinbettung von Arbeit und Land im aktuellen Kapitalismus Zusammenfassung Dieser Text entwickelt eine Polanyi'sche Sichtweise auf die Forschung zu transnationalen Warenketten. Karl Polanyis Analyse einer "Großen Transformation" schärft hierbei insbesondere den Blick für eine sogenannte Dop-Both authors have contributed equally to the development of this paper. Author names are therefore in alphabetical order.

show abstract

Section: Double Movements Around Fictitious Commoditiesmentioning

confidence: 99%

Commodity Studies with Polanyi: Disembedding and Re-Embedding Labour and Land in Contemporary Capitalism

Langthaler¹,

Schüßler²

2019

Österreich Z Soziol

View full text Add to dashboard Cite

show abstract

“…Commodities are things that are useful, or that satisfy human needs. Although a commodity is useful for the person who buys it because it satisfies some needs, it is also useful for the person who sells it because its yielded value exceeds the cost of the labor and material necessary to produce it, either in the form of other commodities or money (Sammond, 2007). Industrialization has accelerated in a series of rapid changes in the organization of people's daily life.…”

Section: Commodification Of Parenthoodmentioning

confidence: 99%

Contractual Transaction: How Renting a Uterus Makes the Human Body a Commodity in Nepal

Subedi

2015

Dhaulagiri

View full text Add to dashboard Cite

The sperm came from Israel. It was frozen in Thailand. The egg donor from South Africa. The embryo traveled to Nepal where an Indian woman was the surrogate mother. Nine months later as the Greengolds were headed to a Kathmandu hospital where the mother had given birth, the earthquake struck… One day when the Greengolds tell their little Yaari about how he was born in the middle of a terrible earthquake, it will be a unique and thrilling story. (Sandip Roy: April 30, 2015

show abstract

“…The concept of commodity provides a cornerstone for the study of capitalism. Classical scholars such as Adam Smith, David Ricardo and Karl Marx define the commodity as a value-bearing product to be sold in a market (Sammond, 2007). While Karl Polanyi (2001) takes up these theoretical strands, he draws a distinction between genuine and fictitious commodities: whereas the former are conceived as goods and services produced for sale on the market, the latter -most importantly, labor and land -are not produced for market sale.…”

mentioning

confidence: 99%

Global Commodities

Landsteiner¹,

Langthaler²

2021

View full text Add to dashboard Cite

Focusing on coca, coffee, gold, soy, sugar, and tea, articles in a special issue of the Austrian Journal of Historical Studies 30/3 (2019) on Global Commodities aim at tracing the emergence of commodity chains through the expansion and contraction of commodity frontiers. Frontier shifts imply complex – and potentially conflicting – interactions shaped by as well as shaping socio-natural systems. Thus, the contributions reveal commodity chains and their frontiers to be subject to negotiations between multiple actors, both human and non-human. Each of the contributions concentrates on one or more world region(s) of frontier shifts, while taking into account the transregional, transnational, and transcontinental connections via commodity chains. Thereby, these commodity-focused histories reveal the benefit of combining global with regional or even local perspectives (Joseph, 2019).

show abstract

Commodities, Commodity Fetishism, and Commodification

Cited by 5 publications

References 6 publications

Commodity Studies with Polanyi: Disembedding and Re-Embedding Labour and Land in Contemporary Capitalism

Commodity Studies with Polanyi: Disembedding and Re-Embedding Labour and Land in Contemporary Capitalism

Contractual Transaction: How Renting a Uterus Makes the Human Body a Commodity in Nepal

Global Commodities

Contact Info

Product

Resources

About