Why do students protest markets? A Polanyian interpretation of anti-neoliberal student protests in England and Chile

This paper proposes an update of Karl Polanyi’s Double Movement Framework (DMF), based on recent debates about neoliberalism and social protests. The paper proposes a situated and continuous interpretation of DMF based on the redefinition of the concept of social dislocation. I define social dislocations as emergent tensions between markets and society that result from the collective organisations of unfulfilled expectations and unequal distribution of value among market participants. The new understanding interprets countermovements as the result of various social dislocations that emerge and disappear in market-making and market-functioning processes. The paper is based on a historical comparative, and qualitative analysis of reforms and protests in the higher education systems of England and Chile over the past decade. The analysis identified five social dislocations that activists shared in both cases. The dislocations help to explain the rise of student countermovements in cases exposed to similar neoliberal policies. The paper concludes by summarising the advantages and limitations of a situated and continuous understanding of DMF to understand contemporary countermovements.