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This is an archive of articles on neoliberalism. Neoliberalism, as a way of thinking, has penetrated the behaviour of a critical mass of influential of decision-makers; or provided sound justification for their inherent, and not always wholesome, desires, in a manner for which it is difficult to find a parallel in recent history. When everything can be thought, and articulated, in terms of preferences, incentives and markets, to the extent that it side-lines all other meritworthy considerations, then one has to understand why has it come to be what has come to be. And more importantly, is it a manner of thinking worth allowing a resident status in our quite impressionable psyches?
Someone was once asked about his views on the process of liberalisation in India that was formally declared and accelerated from 1991 onwards (but initiated in the 1980s) on what it would entail for India. His prompt answer was: India is moving from a low-cost to a high-cost nation. This is a truism which is easy to certify. When making business plan projections for companies this writer realized a similar truism: the costs are guaranteed, income never is. What holds true for entities plays out remarkably precisely at a macroeconomic level. The fact that neoliberalism seems to result in stagnation, or decline, in real wages for measurable sections of society seems to escape scrutiny along with the equally certifiable fact increases the general level of psychological anxiiety.
As a result the received wisdom now stands as neoliberalism coupled with technological advance implies unprecedented material progress for society as a whole on AVERAGE. However, what the received wisdom fails to canvass for is that society lives between the AVERAGES and it is in these intra-statistical crevices that politics of a society shapes up, often in unexpected ways. The paradigm of a hyper-competitive individual who interacts with other individuals through the means of markets for satisfaction of a majority of his wants seems, with a benefit of ample hindsight, a very narrow paradigm to nourish a society. Indeed, it is a paradox that after almost 4,000 years of recorded history, man is at best able to sum up his society in a manner so primitive. One is dead certain that Adam Smith had more in his mind than a group of men as markets.
Note: The compiler of this archive is limited by his own readings. So if anyone comes across articles, which either critique, defend or explain the underpinnings of this all encompassing notion please drop a direct message on twitter.
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