STRUCTURAL POWER AND THE CONSTRUCTION OF MARKETS: THE CASE OF RHYTHM AND BLUES

• Published in: Comparative Studies of Culture and Power Vol. 21; pp. 147 - 201
• Main Author: Dowd, Timothy J
• Format: Book Chapter
• Language: English
• Published: Emerald Group Publishing Limited 01.01.2003
• ISBN: 9780762308859; 0762308850
• ISSN: 0195-6310
• DOI: 10.1016/S0195-6310(03)21006-1

The study of markets encompasses a number of disciplines – including anthropology, economics, history, and sociology – and a larger number of theoretical frameworks (see Plattner, 1989; Reddy, 1984; Smelser & Swedberg, 1994). Despite this disciplinary and theoretical diversity, scholarship on markets tends toward either realist or constructionist accounts (Dobbin, 1994; Dowd & Dobbin, forthcoming).1 Realist accounts treat markets as extant arenas that mostly (or should) conform to a singular ideal-type. Realists thus take the existence of markets as given and examine factors that supposedly shape all markets in a similar fashion. When explaining market outcomes, they tout such factors as competition, demand, and technology; moreover, they can treat the impact of these factors as little influenced by context. Constructionist accounts treat markets as emergent arenas that result in a remarkable variety of types. They problematize the existence of markets and examine how contextual factors contribute to this variety. When explaining market outcomes, some show that social relations and/or cultural assumptions found in a particular setting can qualify the impact of competition (Uzzi, 1997), demand (Peiss, 1998), and technology (Fischer, 1992). Constructionists thus stress the contingent, rather than universal, processes that shape markets.