A German pro-market economist excused Pinochet-era repression while resenting traffic lights at home
Evidence
Whereas freedom is commonly described as the highest neoliberal value, Schmölders’s advocacy of freedom was apparently very selective. Visiting Santiago de Chile he had only witnessed “many police regulating traffic and guaranteeing public order,” but not heard any “cries of those tortured … penetrating the thick walls of the prison” as media reports would have suggested. Yet, at home, even traffic regulation seemed to be too burdensome to endure. — Dieter Plehwe, Quinn Slobodian & Philip Mirowski (eds.), Nine Lives of Neoliberalism, 344
Categorization
- DEEPTHINKING: The asymmetry — denouncing domestic traffic lights while willfully deaf to torture in the country whose ‘order’ he admired — is a chilling, dense case study in how freedom discourse gets selectively deployed across borders.
- XREF: Echoes the core thesis of the reader’s What I’m reading for: small acts of decorum toward abstract order outweigh ethical engagement with actual victims. — connects to: Even allied neoliberal media refused to publish Hayek’s defense of Pinochet — Philip Mirowski & Dieter Plehwe (eds.), The Road from Mont Pèlerin: The Making…, 1618; Hayek repeatedly praised Pinochet, Salazar, and Suharto’s dictatorships as liberty-preserving — Jessica Whyte, The Morals of the Market: Human Rights…, 363; Hayek actively defended the Pinochet regime against human rights criticism. — Jessica Whyte, The Morals of the Market: Human Rights…, 304 (+4 more)
- QUESTION: Worth chasing: to what extent did this selective blindness characterize other ordoliberal/German economists’ engagements with the Southern Cone dictatorships?
Broader Connections
- Hayek actively defended the Pinochet regime against human rights criticism.
#expands(0.90) — Jessica Whyte, The Morals of the Market, 304 - Hayek repeatedly praised Pinochet, Salazar, and Suharto’s dictatorships as liberty-preserving
#expands(0.85) — Jessica Whyte, The Morals of the Market, 363 - Hayek directly legitimized Pinochet’s dictatorship as more liberal than unrestricted democracy.
#expands(0.85) — Philip Mirowski & Dieter Plehwe (eds.), The Road from Mont Pèlerin, 1592 - Nobel-winning Chicago economists actively endorsed Pinochet’s dictatorship
#corroborates(0.85) — Jessica Whyte, The Morals of the Market, 329 - Hayek and Friedman personally advised and legitimized the Pinochet dictatorship.
#corroborates(0.80) — Jessica Whyte, The Morals of the Market, 305 - Even allied neoliberal media refused to publish Hayek’s defense of Pinochet
#corroborates(0.75) — Philip Mirowski & Dieter Plehwe (eds.), The Road from Mont Pèlerin, 1618