Countermovements: Rural Social Imaginaries Confronting Neoliberal Economics and Politics in Southern Poland

During the postsocialist economic transformation, liberal economic and political ideas encountered different pre-existing ontologies of power, work, and economics in Poland, which were particularly prevalent in rural mountain regions in the south. This different world-making is the basis for a Polanyian counter-movement against marketisation. However, the incompatibility of alternative ontologies does not prevent villagers from achieving economic success. These inherited ontologies are stabilising the uncertainties stemming from economic and political liberalisation through family ties and appraisal tools based on the values of rural culture