Nationalization
The title mentions a Great Transformation, which the reader discovers is a reference to the growth of national economies. Although nationalization is sometimes thought of as a political idea, Polanyi urges the reader to consider the political reality of a nation as a derivative of economic ideas. Nationalization is therefore a portrait of the alignment of powerful economic interests at the national level. Instead of villages competing against villages, the nations are now in a global competition against superpowers.
Urbanization and industrialization
The changes of urbanization and industrialization are indispensable in this book. These abstract instances of imagery have physical, concrete aspects, like factories and urban buildings, but they represent a change in the way humans live—not just a change in what lives look like. Instead of living in a village with some property, most of the working class now rents from wealthy land-owners, paying them an ongoing perpetual profit, further dividing the classes.
Ancient kingdoms
The imagery of ancient ways of life is mentioned for contrast. The kingdoms discussed include African empires like Egypt, Mediterranean empires like Greece and Rome, and Mesopotamian empires. These empires have something in common, though their costume varies by location: they do trade in commodities and not in currencies. There is no global exchange rate for instance, and they don't accept paper money from each other; when commodities are given, commodities are received in exchange. This is what the author finds natural and obvious.
The abstract-to-concrete path of ideas
Instead of seeing capitalism as an obvious way of life, Polanyi reminds the reader that there was a time before these ideas. Then, they were just ideas, spoken by politicians through rhetoric, and now, hundreds of years later, those ideas have shaped the development of the West for so long that they seem obvious. The important part of this imagery is that by noticing the way ideas grow into reality, we can strategically create more stable philosophies for tomorrow to emerge from.
