Economists and think-tank neoliberals respond to disconfirming evidence differently

Evidence

In the last few years, there may have opened up a divergence between the explicit behavior of professional economists and that of other groups who may have displayed some allegiance to neoliberal doctrines. This distinction, insisted upon in chapter 1, now begins to bite. The difference comes with the economists readily accepting that they do share some common doctrines and intellectual orientations. Their PhD from a ranked institution does double duty as a membership card; few of them spend any time doubting whether “economics” as a body of doctrine exists. Thus it will prove relatively straight­forward to demonstrate that they have not revised their erstwhile doctrines dating from before the crisis. But the denizens of the think tank planisphere and journalists and political actors in these contentious times may not subscribe so intently or openly to a fixed, discrete set of doctrines in quite the same unself-conscious manner. (Indeed, ­chapter 6 will propose a stratified spectrum of crisis response under neoliberalism.) Consequently, demonstration of the fundamental premise of cognitive dissonance theory—that people don’t shift allegiances in the throes of contravening evidence—will require more elaborate documentation for the neoliberals. — Philip Mirowski, Never Let a Serious Crisis Go to Waste, 101

Categorization

• QUESTION: The claim that a ranked PhD ‘does double duty as a membership card’ — i.e., credentialing itself substitutes for doctrinal self-examination — is a sharp mechanism worth chasing in how the thought collective’s stratification works.
• corroborated: 3 independent passages support this claim — Philip Mirowski, Never Let a Serious Crisis Go to Waste, 101
• XREF: connects to: Neoliberal theories succeed as policy rhetoric despite having scant evidence — Mark Blyth, Austerity: The History of a Dangerous…, 425; Cognitive dissonance drives economists and neoliberals to treat crisis as reinforcing their beliefs; Neoliberalism’s deliberate epistemic inconsistencies enabled its long-term success (+2 more)

Broader Connections

• Cognitive dissonance drives economists and neoliberals to treat crisis as reinforcing their beliefs #corroborates (0.85)
• Neoliberalism’s deliberate epistemic inconsistencies enabled its long-term success #expands (0.85)
• Neoliberal theories succeed as policy rhetoric despite having scant evidence #expands (0.80) — Mark Blyth, Austerity, 425
• Neoliberalism’s resilience rests on deliberate epistemic inconsistency across discourse levels. #expands (0.80) — Dieter Plehwe, Quinn Slobodian & Philip Mirowski (eds.), Nine Lives of Neoliberalism, 93
• Neoliberals understood the organizational nature of knowledge better than their critics did #expands (0.75) — Philip Mirowski & Dieter Plehwe (eds.), The Road from Mont Pèlerin, 2117