Weber and Polanyi

An exchange economy rests on networks of relationships that are contractual in nature, according to Weber. On this Polanyi would agree. Economic exchange or trade not only includes modern market relations, but more direct relations. For example balanced reciprocity in which social rapport is what is important not material gain. Administrative trade also puts peace above profit. Plunder and the profit motive are born from the same mother and both their fathers were strangers. Plunder, production for profit, financial investments are made from the same cloth. Both Max Weber and Karl Polanyi offer a dialectical balance to Marxism