ABSTRACT
The Introduction explains why certain approaches and tools of science and technology studies (STS) might be particularly useful in studying the economic thought of Michael Polanyi. Polanyi was on a mission to save liberalism, democracy and Western civilization in the 1930s and 1940s. To complete his mission he developed a vision of a new economics, and the first economics film to be used as a vessel to spread his postmodern ideas. This chapter argues why a rich archival research focusing on the subjective minutiae of economic ideas might result in better accounts of interwar economics. And it also shows why STS fits to the purpose of analysing such subjectively drawn topographies of power, disciplinarity and society. The Introduction reviews previous accounts using science and technology studies to analyse the economy or economics in order to be able to define the school to which this book belongs.
