• Students should be able to outline the advantages and limitations of core theoretical approaches in economic sociology
• Critically apply theories, methods and models of both classical and more recent economic sociologists to contemporary business and economic problems
• Differentiate between different forms of co-ordination in the economy
• Identify the differences between ‘status’ and ‘standard-offer’ markets
• Show how different economic sociologists have explained the emergence of value in an economy
• Discuss the differences between different forms of economic valuation
• Discuss the differences between Schumpeterian and non-Schumpeterian understandings of entrepreneurship
• Explain the differences between a market economy and a market society

Based on a mix of lectures and case study discussions, this course will introduce FLØK students to key concepts in contemporary economic sociology, including competition, entrepreneurship, innovation, markets, marketization, and value. The course will begin by introducing students to classical sociological approaches to economic life, mainly through thinkers like Weber, Simmel, Polanyi, and Schumpeter. In the second part of the course, students will be introduced to some of the more recent schools of thought in economic sociology, especially those that focus on how markets get shaped through practices of valuation (e.g., Boltanski & Thevenot). Discussions of other more recent schools of thought in economic sociology will also include Bourdieu, Callon and Foucault. 

All lectures will be followed up by short case studies which introduce a market-situation which will test students’ ability to apply and critique the methods and theoretical principles that were introduced during the lecture. A key aim of the course is to enable students to pursue research and interpret the phenomena of markets and innovation by drawing on a wide range of social theorists, but also to understand the limitations of, for example, ‘purely’ Marxist, Weberian or Schumpeterian analyses of market societies.   

• Students will receive a grounding in classical approaches to economic sociology as well as insights into more contemporary schools of thought in economic sociology

• Students will learn how economists of the neoclassical tradition (‘mainstream’) and, by contrast, how sociologists study and theorize market-related phenomena

• Students will learn how economists of the neoclassical tradition (‘mainstream’) and, by contrast, how sociologists study and theorize market-related phenomena

• Students will learn how recent approaches in economic sociology provide a novel understanding of how market participants create, enact, order and discount value

• Students will engage with Schumpeterian and more recent, non-Schumpeterian approaches to understanding entrepreneurship, innovation and competition in the market

Indicative Reading List:

• Patrick Aspers, Markets. Polity Press, 2011.
• Victor Nee and Richard Swedberg, The Economic Sociology of Capitalism. Princeton University Press, 2005.
• Richard Swedberg, Principles of Economic Sociology. Princeton University Press, 2007.
• Isabelle Dussauge, Claes-Fredrik Helgesson and Francis Lee, ‘Valuography: studying the making of values’. In: Value Practices in the Life Sciences and Medicine (ed. by I. Dussauge, C.-F. Helgesson and F. Lee). Oxford University Press, 2015.
• Janos Kornai, Dynamism, Rivalry and the Surplus Economy. Oxford University Press, 2014.
• Martin Kornberger et al (eds.), Making Things Valuable. Oxford University Press, 2015.