[Anonymouse]

It's funny how I read the article and it was as if I was reading something out of the works of my Historical Materialist professor on economic theory. In the end not even my professor can account for the "transition from feudalism to capitalism". What I learned in historical materialism, and this article which pretty much agrees with historical materialism, as taught per my professor, is that there are social units and we are a part of it, no individual aside from the whole. Of course, in the end my professor concluded, that history is a result of "unintended consequences", but didn't quite finish the sentence. I simply deduced the rest since it was inidividuals acting, for their interest.

I would say that there is no need to refute this, simply read Mises' regutation of Marx, and you'll have all you need. But if you would like to find a refutation of Polanyi's arguments it can be found in Morris Silvers, "Karl Polanyi and Markets in the Ancient Near East: The challenge of the evidence", Journal of Economic History, Vol.XLIII, no.4, December 1983.