Market society utopianism in penal politics

Corcoran

Abstract

This chapter examines the utopian intellectual origins of some strands of contemporary free-market ideas and practices from their post-war revival via thinkers such as Friedrich Hayek, whose ideas went on to influence the New Right following the economic and political crises of the 1970s. The discussion then draws on Karl Polyani’s (1945) Origins of our Time: The Great Transformation, where he first gave theoretical expression to the concept of a 'market society’. Published just after the Second World War and in the context of emerging welfare states, these thinkers marked out the ideological cleavages that have dominated political-economic thought since. The chapter considers the pre-eminence of free market ideology with regards to its impact on penal politics and thinking. It concludes by noting that predictions of the withering away of outsourcing and competitive regimes in the aftermath of the financial crisis of 2007-8 appear to be a ‘false dawn’. However, a change in direction may be imminent in the wake of controversial and costly terminations of penal service contracts.

Citation

Corcoran. (2021). Market society utopianism in penal politics. In Privatisation and Marketisation in Criminal Justice (15 - 30). Cambridge University Press. https://doi.org/10.46692/9781447346173.002

• Acceptance Date: Jul 1, 2019
• Online Publication Date: Mar 10, 2021
• Publication Date: Mar 10, 2021
• Publicly Available Date: May 26, 2023
• Publisher: Cambridge University Press
• Pages: 15 - 30
• Book Title: Privatisation and Marketisation in Criminal Justice
• DOI: https://doi.org/10.46692/9781447346173.002