Commodities taken to the market for the single purpose of exchange form the market supply. A good should be supplied on the market in order to be a commodity. If not a part of the market supply, an economic good is not a commodity but just a product. The particular commodity is brought to the market because other commodities are supplied there as well, and they ultimately have to be exchanged for each other. The supply of commodities makes the market – not the demand for them. In its pure ontological form, the exchange here is given as a gift and a contra-gift.
Historical Backdrop
• BRONISLAW MALINOWSKI The Primitive Economics of the Trobriand Islanders: gift and contra-gift.
• MARCEL MAUSS The gift: obligation to return gifts.
• GEORGE AKERLOF Labor Contracts as Partial Gift Exchange: gift exchange.
• JEAN BAUDRILLARD For a Critique of the Political Economy of the Sign: the logic of symbolic exchange.
• JEAN-FRANCOIS LYOTARD Libidinal Economy: donatory exchange.