ABSTRACT
Markets are social institutions and they have assumed a variety of forms throughout human history. Neo-liberalism has been the dominant economic and political discourse since the mid-1970s and central to it have been assumptions about the efficiency of the "free" market and the virtue of "self-interest" exercised by the individual as a "sovereign consumer" expressing "choice" in and through the marketplace. The introduction of quasi-market forces and the cultivation of private enterprise initiatives within the public sector signify a relative withdrawal of the democratic state from a number of key sectors of social life and a diminution of its role as "guardian of the public interest." The freedom that is frequently associated with the market is a freedom without responsibility, a freedom from responsibility. The increased integration of countries and peoples around the world through processes of globalization has not led to greater economic stability or to a reduction in poverty.
