Paper info: Markets, Market Making and Marketing
Title
Markets, Market Making and Marketing
Authors
Luis Araujo
University of Manchester
United Kingdom
Place of Publication
The paper was published at the 20th IMP-conference in Copenhagen, Denmark in 2004.
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Abstract
Recent debates in economic sociology have moved away from a critique to homo economicus to a focus on how market exchange is formalised and abstracted from society. Rather than dwell on the disparities between the formalism and the practice of market exchange, the work of Michel Callon and associates focuses on the calculating agencies that make homo economicus a reality. This paper argues that this work has important consequences for marketing theory and practice. We concur with Callon's argument that marketing theory has a role not just in explaining how markets work but also in performing and formatting markets. However, we look upon marketing's role in performing the market as a series of distributed and loosely coordinated associations and representations rather than strongly convergent networks. In addition, they are always fragile and unstable constructions linking supply and demand, and always likely to be destabilised by divergent interests and rival alternatives.