IPE and European Integration: Applying Karl Polanyi's 'the Great Transformation'

European integration is usually studied within the realms of comparative politics. The multitude of empirical studies concerning the topic have been well suited to its numerous methodologies and analytical frameworks. Comparative politics however, usually ignores the question of why European integration has both progressively deepened and widened during the last thirty years. Therefore there is a distinct absence of how developments in the global political economy determine European integration. Such an approach fails to address the issues of power and constraint within the global economy. We would therefore expect the process to be examined within international political economy, yet there has been a relative neglect of European integration within IPE as it considers the process to be a mere regional response to global developments. This paper argues that European integration is a more complex process than IPE has considered and addresses its relative neglect by applying Polanyi’s 'the Great Transformation'. Firstly, this paper argues that existing comparative politics and IPE approaches to European integration have a number of shortcomings which limits their application. Secondly, to address these limitations this paper applies 'the Great Transformation' to European integration and argues there to be strong parallels between Polanyi’s theory and the process. Thirdly, the paper argues that European integration is much more than a simplistic regional response to globalisation. European integration has been a contradictory process oscillating between neoliberalism and the European Social model. This highlights not just the contradictions of European integration, but also what Polanyi termed the ‘market society’. ..PAT.-Unpublished Manuscript