ABSTRACT
As E. P. Thompson noted, in describing the great transformations at work in human societies, economic and political history too often lead to a discussion of abstract social forces or the depersonalisation of the social forces present in favour of a history of ideologies (Thompson 1961). Deregulation, the opening of markets to competition and the free market are not government mechanisms that have run on automatic pilot since the writings of Hayek. They are organised and promoted by specific social configurations in which they have been appropriated, adapted to the balance of social forces and updated through the practices of actors who may be central or marginal to the field of power.
