Early neoliberal development thought prescribed conservative reform and was not yet confident.

Evidence

Whereas Röpke’s thinking in particular was nostalgic in some ways, both Benham’s and Röpke’s reasoning already contained programmatic neoliberal elements of change: conservative reform was prescribed, requiring concessions both from developed countries and from feudal landowners in developing countries. Neoliberal scholarship thus displayed its own moments of critique of the status quo. But we cannot yet observe great confidence in a neoliberal economic perspective. The developmentalist argument was primarily countered with general sociological, moral, and historical arguments. — Philip Mirowski & Dieter Plehwe (eds.), The Road from Mont Pèlerin, 1292

Categorization

• QUESTION: How did this early ‘conservative reform’ framing evolve into the confident hard-data development economics of Bauer and later neoliberalism?
• XREF: connects to: Early liberals shared an unresolved ambivalence about the state that seeded austerity — Mark Blyth, Austerity: The History of a Dangerous…, 269; Neoliberalism’s early adherents faced deep uncertainty about their prospects — Angus Burgin, The Great Persuasion: Reinventing Free…, 149; Early neoliberals rejected laissez-faire and wanted strong state action (+7 more)

Broader Connections

• Early neoliberals explicitly distanced themselves from classical laissez-faire doctrine #corroborates (0.85) — Philip Mirowski, Never Let a Serious Crisis Go to Waste, 117
• Early neoliberalism rejected laissez-faire in favor of a state-built competitive order. #expands (0.85) — Dieter Plehwe, Quinn Slobodian & Philip Mirowski (eds.), Nine Lives of Neoliberalism, 365
• Early neoliberals rejected laissez-faire and wanted strong state action #expands (0.82)
• Neoliberalism’s dominant emotion was anxiety, not confident hubris #corroborates (0.80) — Quinn Slobodian, Globalists, 81
• Shared ideological critique did not yet imply a clear program of positive policy #expands (0.78) — Angus Burgin, The Great Persuasion, 167
• Neoliberalism was only emergent in Foucault’s time, not yet hegemonic #corroborates (0.75) — Wendy Brown, Undoing the Demos, 90
• Neoliberal development thought began decades before its late-1970s influence. #expands (0.75) — Philip Mirowski & Dieter Plehwe (eds.), The Road from Mont Pèlerin, 1264
• Neoliberal development thought predated and coexisted with left-wing theories rather than countering them #expands (0.74) — Philip Mirowski & Dieter Plehwe (eds.), The Road from Mont Pèlerin, 1266