ABSTRACT
The market and industry is viewed as a social structure qua institution and whose existence is predicated on continuous and sequential transactions of a specific product. The market is also the site of socially structured competition, which means that variations in the social structures result in different kinds of competition within and across markets. It follows that the market must be carefully crafted and competition suitably regulated so that it can be a safe home for going enterprises. With this concept of the market and industry, this chapter deals with the structure of market demand. As a structure, the market consists of a set of property rights, a social and physical infrastructure that facilitates transactions, legal rules and informal practices that facilitate transactions, legal rules and practices that specify how enterprises are organized and engage with each other in the market. The technical and income dimensions of consumption products are similar to those of investment products.
