The Illusion of Free Markets, by Bernard Harcourt 2011

"The grounding assumption of both early and contemporary liberal thought, then, is the core belief in the duality of free markets versus regulation.  But as we have seen, the categories themselves fall apart under close scrutiny.  These central notions of "natural order," "market efficiency," and "free markets"--as well as their inverse, "regulation," "discipline," or "heavily regulated markets"--are mere conceptual tropes that serve no useful analytical purpose.  They hinder, rather than help.  And they have had a devastating effect in the political sphere....We now come to the price--the price we pay for believing that the economy is the realm of natural orderliness and that the legitimate and competent sphere of government administration lies elsewhere, in policing and punishing.  That steep price includes, first, naturalizing the regulatory mechanisms in our contemporary markets and thereby shielding the massive wealth distributions that occur daily; and second, massively expanding the carceral sphere."