Markets and violence

ABSTRACT

In this commentary, I address different forms of corporate violence, in particular how some contemporary corporate practices result in violence. Violence is carried out often without impunity by a market-state nexus that enables accumulation by dispossession. Structural violence concentrates power on certain groups while creating a class of disposable labour. Epistemic violence involves using language and law to disempower specific groups of people. The state often uses instrumental violence to quell resistance. I discuss how violence operates in the political economy by discussing conflicts in the extractive industries.