Third Interdisciplinary Market Studies Workshop

The 3rd Interdisciplinary Market Studies Workshop was held on June 5- 6, 2014 in a beautiful former convent in Saint-Maximin-la-Sainte-Baume, 3IWMSSouthern France.

The program designed by the organizers, Kimberly Chong (University of London), Susi Geiger (University College Dublin), Hans Kjellberg (Stockholm School of Economics) et Alexandre Mallard (Mines ParisTech), follows up the reflections initiated during the two biennial Workshops; in 2010, it concentrated on marketing processes approached through a variety of empirical contexts (First IMSW Sigtuna, Sweden), and in 2012, on the order and market values (Second IMSW Dublin, Ireland, 2012). This year, the Workshop focused on the actors who often ‘hide’ behind these processes, but are an integral part of performing markets. The Workshop program was set around three main themes:

The role of creativity and narrative construction in shaping markets

Studying the role played by creativity and the forms of narratives produced by the actors to give sense to material and social reality sheds a new light on decision-making and on trade behavior related questions. In some Workshop sessions, the main issue was the construction of market actors and products; in others, the prescriptive dimension of narrative construction was the focus of attention, in particular on gastronomy or fashion markets; finally, a session was organized around studies in which numbers, charts and algorithms produced and used by the actors were analyzed as market devices.

Personhood and market subjects

The research work presented at the sessions organized on this topic concentrate on the role played by the construction of the consumer, or the making of economic subjects in market agencements.

Market empowerment

The sessions were focused on how the actors come to reach positions of power in and through the market. Namely how the material dimension of markets, regarding in particular the issue of access and control on the trade devices to which the empowerment of certain actors and the dis-empowerment of others are bound.

Photo: Couvent Royal (XIIth-XVth century), Saint-Maximin-la-Sainte-Baume. Photo credit: Catherine Lucas.