The market that could be but is not : market failure as ontological politics and the reconfiguration of public transport in Stockholm
(2024) In Consumption Markets and Culture 27(6). p.555-568- Abstract
Market failure is a concept invoked in both economics and public policy to justify governmental interventions in the marketplace. Drawing on more than five years of qualitative research on public transport in Stockholm, this paper explores how market failure, operating as a form of folk theory within public policy, informed a legal reform. This reform aimed to reconfigure an established contractual regime, where competition centered around procurement contracts “for-the-market,” with a new regime focused on competition for passengers “in-the-market.” Conceptualizing market failure and the two notions of competition underlying it as a matter of ontological politics, the reconfiguration of the market orbited around conflicts of the nature... (More)
Market failure is a concept invoked in both economics and public policy to justify governmental interventions in the marketplace. Drawing on more than five years of qualitative research on public transport in Stockholm, this paper explores how market failure, operating as a form of folk theory within public policy, informed a legal reform. This reform aimed to reconfigure an established contractual regime, where competition centered around procurement contracts “for-the-market,” with a new regime focused on competition for passengers “in-the-market.” Conceptualizing market failure and the two notions of competition underlying it as a matter of ontological politics, the reconfiguration of the market orbited around conflicts of the nature of it, but also around its temporal configuration. Taken together, this study points to how the boundaries between multiple markets are not only emerging “here and now” but also how markets “now and later” are invoked in market configurations.
(Less)
- author
- Paulsson, Alexander LU
- organization
- publishing date
- 2024-11-18
- type
- Contribution to journal
- publication status
- published
- subject
- keywords
- Competition, market failure, ontological politics, public transport
- in
- Consumption Markets and Culture
- volume
- 27
- issue
- 6
- pages
- 14 pages
- publisher
- Routledge
- external identifiers
-
- scopus:85209595134
- ISSN
- 1025-3866
- DOI
- 10.1080/10253866.2024.2370940
- language
- English
- LU publication?
- yes
- additional info
- Publisher Copyright: © 2024 The Author(s). Published by Informa UK Limited, trading as Taylor & Francis Group.
- id
- e95cae73-f405-454e-9529-94b851c8850a
- date added to LUP
- 2024-11-29 06:37:28
- date last changed
- 2025-06-19 13:24:21
@article{e95cae73-f405-454e-9529-94b851c8850a,
abstract = {{<p>Market failure is a concept invoked in both economics and public policy to justify governmental interventions in the marketplace. Drawing on more than five years of qualitative research on public transport in Stockholm, this paper explores how market failure, operating as a form of folk theory within public policy, informed a legal reform. This reform aimed to reconfigure an established contractual regime, where competition centered around procurement contracts “for-the-market,” with a new regime focused on competition for passengers “in-the-market.” Conceptualizing market failure and the two notions of competition underlying it as a matter of ontological politics, the reconfiguration of the market orbited around conflicts of the nature of it, but also around its temporal configuration. Taken together, this study points to how the boundaries between multiple markets are not only emerging “here and now” but also how markets “now and later” are invoked in market configurations.</p>}},
author = {{Paulsson, Alexander}},
issn = {{1025-3866}},
keywords = {{Competition; market failure; ontological politics; public transport}},
language = {{eng}},
month = {{11}},
number = {{6}},
pages = {{555--568}},
publisher = {{Routledge}},
series = {{Consumption Markets and Culture}},
title = {{The market that could be but is not : market failure as ontological politics and the reconfiguration of public transport in Stockholm}},
url = {{http://dx.doi.org/10.1080/10253866.2024.2370940}},
doi = {{10.1080/10253866.2024.2370940}},
volume = {{27}},
year = {{2024}},
}