This article
Sociologica
N. 2/2007
Doi: 10.2383/24765
Copyright © 2007 by Società editrice il Mulino, Bologna
Focus
Political Economy and Network Analysis
An Untapped Convergence
Abstract
In recent years, sociologists have paid increasing attention
to the economy. Two broad fields have emerged, both of which have roots in classical
sociology: political economy and economic sociology. Political economy has focused
primarily on the embeddedness of economic activity within larger political
institutions. Economic sociology has focused primarily on the behavior of firms
within product markets and the meanings that economic actors draw from the cultures
in which they operate. I argue that the two approaches are fully compatible, and
that network analysis has the potential to provide a synthesis between them. I
illustrate this with a discussion of the field of power structure research-an area
in which scholars have examined the relations between corporations and the state. I
discuss the decline of power structure research, and argue that renewed attention to
this area could provide a means of linking political economy, economic sociology,
and the study of social networks.
Keywords:
economic sociology, political economy, social networks.