There was an article in the Financial Review here in Australia, about the “Real OzCar Scandal”.
In a short book published in 1944 and titled Bureaucracy, one of the godfathers of “neo-liberalism”, the Austrian economist Ludwig von Mises, summed up one of the problems with government bail-outs - it gives the government “unlimited power to ruin every enterprise or to lavish favours upon it”.
He was the Last Knight of Liberalism, but what is the deal with neo-liberalism? That’s Reagan / Thatcher esque right?
I dunno, it just annoys me profusely.. the PM writes an essay attacking “Neo-Liberalism” and it’s all strawmen against Hayek etc.
Yet - how does Neo-liberalism differ from classic liberalism? And if what we have had is Neo-Liberalism, then it’s Keyesianism? Eh?
Well, the ‘experts’ haven’t decided what label various persons living and deceased belong under. Since only a select few here even use the word liberal anymore except in its Americanized butchering it doesn’t really seem to matter. So we have these weird titles floating around.
A literal Austrian, Erik von Kuehnelt Leddihn made a chart distinguishing between what he called four phases of liberalism in his book “Leftism”. He defined “Pre-Liberals” as those who had certain ideas about freedom before the coining of the word ‘liberal’, usually from a humanist, utilitarian, or economic perspective; Adam Smith, Edmund Burke, Voltaire, Turgot and a few others certainly qualify as these. Then came the “Early Liberals” who gave the natural rights or divine rights case for freedom. Alexis de Tocqueville, Lord Acton, and a few others fall in here. Ludwig von Mises, would fall in the next phase "Old Liberalism or Paleo-liberalism; the old liberals matched up with the Pre-liberals in that they gave the humanist, utilitarian, and/or economic case for freedom.
I forgot how he described Neo-liberalism, except that he was one and that he put Wilhelm Ropke, and maybe even Hayek in the bunch… I will go look through the book again. Sorry if that wasn’t helpful.
You expose them for their utter ignorance and stupidity. Mises is an exponent of classical liberalism. He has nothing to do with neoliberalism, a different kettle of fish. Twats like throwing around “neo-liberal” as an insult, so in their circles it connotes a pseudo-intellectual hack on the payroll of big business.
Which is all the more absurd given that big businesses hate classical liberalism and free markets. They prefer corporatism, interventionism, bailouts, mercantilism, anti-trust, IP, etc. which grants them artificial barriers to entry to starve out and prevent competition.
Liberalism is about laissez-faire, letting people do as they please in every area but those few which are considered legitimate state monopolies.
Neo-liberalism, also known as Ordnungspolitik (policy of order), goes one step further and grants the state the right to infringe upon market actions as long as a generally applicable rule is created, i.e. working hour limitations would probably be fine for a neoliberal because they apply to all businesses whereas a specific bailout would not be supported.
Keynesianism still supports the market process, but considers it inherently faulty and has no problems with state micro-management of market conditions and market processes to keep economic aggregates up and well. The principles of market and competition are not as important to Keynesians as they are to liberals and neo-liberals.
A way to understand neoliberalism is that it treats the nation-state as a firm, the goal of which is maximising its profit. It is thus in a sense similar to mercantilism. Classical liberals have no such pretensions and generally see the state as pernicious, even if (in their opinion) necessary.
I remember now. Kuehnelt-Leddihn defined neoliberalism as a movement of those persons who saw the state as necessary to provide an apparatus, or environment, for market actors to run around in. They believed that the state was necessary to provide protections for ‘competition’, and that the market didn’t respect the dignity of man, or such tripe. =] Neoliberalism and Neoconservatism are pretty much indistinguishable in the present age.
It should be interesting to note that although Kuehnelt-Leddihn still considered himself a neoliberal at the time of his death, he had completely changed his mind on the market, stating that no controls were necessary. I stopped reading Kuehnelt Leddihn when I realized he had some extremely annoying superstitious views. ( I listened to a lecture of his on exorcism and I haven’t read or listened to him on anything since, but he did introduce me to Mises and the others, so for that I am appreciative)