{"id":174,"date":"2021-01-27T16:36:41","date_gmt":"2021-01-27T21:36:41","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/commons.princeton.edu\/invisible-violence\/?page_id=174"},"modified":"2021-05-11T18:57:16","modified_gmt":"2021-05-11T22:57:16","slug":"health-as-a-commodity","status":"publish","type":"page","link":"https:\/\/commons.princeton.edu\/invisible-violence\/health-as-a-commodity\/","title":{"rendered":"HEALTH AS A COMMODITY"},"content":{"rendered":"

It is necessary to contextualize how the market acts to regulate everyday life activities to understand how our society has achieved vast health disparities. In his text\u00a0<\/span>The Great Transformation,\u00a0<\/span><\/em>Karl Polanyi discusses the ethics of our capitalist market system through the lens of the connections of markets and social goods. In this text, Polanyi argued against the ideas of neoliberal economics by articulating that our society\u2019s idea of a free market is a social fact, created and maintained by social institutions and regulations; the \u201cfree market\u201d is not reflective of human nature or fact but is instead an ideology. Polanyi\u2019s perspective shows us that market structures (which are conglomerates of relationships) are both real and socially constructed; therefore, we can visualize them.<\/span><\/p>\n

The neoliberal school of thought, broken down into 3 assumptions:<\/h4>\n
    \n
  1. \u201cThat markets are the best and most efficient allocators of resources in production and distribution<\/span><\/li>\n
  2. That societies are composed of autonomous individuals (producers and consumers) motivated chiefly or entirely by material or economic considerations<\/span><\/li>\n
  3. That competition is the major market vehicle for innovations\u201d (Coburn 2000, 138).<\/span><\/li>\n<\/ol>\n

    As Coburn (2000) summarizes, the idea of choice and precisely the \u201cright\u201d to choose is a defining characteristic of neoliberalism. However, how neoliberalism constructs the idea of \u201cchoice\u201d is not representative of choice in our society.\u00a0<\/span>Choice cannot exist if every individual does not have the equal opportunity to choose<\/span><\/strong>; this is how neoliberalism propagates inequality. While individuals may be considered \u201cconsumers,\u201d\u00a0<\/span>not every individual has the same access or ability to consume due to structures present in their present or historical environments that hinder upward mobility.<\/span><\/strong><\/p>\n

    How “regulation” ties into neoliberalism<\/h4>\n

    Another critical characteristic of a neoliberal market is that it is “<\/span>unregulated<\/span><\/strong>.” Because neoliberalism values individual choice and views humans as only looking out for their self-interests, the unregulated market is tied with the idea that “the pursuit of individual self-interest [is] the innate motivation of human nature.”<\/span><\/p>\n

    Conversely, the\u00a0<\/span>regulated<\/span><\/strong>\u00a0market, which Polanyi argues can\u00a0<\/span>mitigate inequality<\/span><\/strong>, acknowledges that humans are “social animals” that “define and realize themselves in relation to others” (Block & Somers 2014, 30).<\/span><\/p>\n

    The key difference between these two views on the market centers around human nature (whether it is innate and driven by the individual) or is the result of cultural and societal relationships. It is important to emphasize that no market represents the “fact” of human nature; this idea is contrary to neoliberal ideology. Instead, all markets are ideologies: social structures that humans create and employ.<\/span><\/p>\n

    The following chart aims to describe the differences between regulated and unregulated markets; further, it provides some context for the following examples on the process of\u00a0<\/span>deregulation.\u00a0<\/span><\/strong><\/p>\n