Markets and Power

In what ways do the actions and economic behavior of today's multinational corporations resemble the functioning and processes of the old command economics of the Soviet Union? By ignoring questions about power relations in markets mainstream neoclassically-oriented economists conclude that there are no significant power structures operating in market systems to control allocation and distribution. This book argues to the contrary that there are fundamental and systemic power structures - monopoly access to information or finance employer power etc. - at work in market economies which affects their ability to achieve real competition in much the same way as state-controlled command economies hinder business activities. Thus for example the biggest firms at the hubs of financial networks wield a kind of shaping power upon large numbers of relatively autonomous firms not only upon those that belong to the networks but also on the many firms outside them that are also affected.