Hayek feared moral and religious decline could destroy market civilization

Evidence

In attributing the development of morality to the ‘survival of the successful’, Hayek presented a racialised narrative that took for granted that those Europeans who had developed commercial relations were more successful than others. He saw their success as a result of their adoption of ‘moral conceptions which do not prescribe particular aims but rather general rules limiting the range of permitted actions’. In his contemporaries’ demands for social justice and social and economic rights Hayek saw atavistic attempts on the part of ‘the non-domesticated or un-civilized’ members of society to resurrect the morals of a ‘tribal society’. From such a perspective, socialism and social democracy were not merely economic threats to the productivity and efficiency of economic relations; they were civilisational regressions, the return of ‘suppressed primordial instincts’ that threatened the moral foundations of the competitive market. — Jessica Whyte, The Morals of the Market, 30 (#expands, via linked claim)

Hayek’s own approach to religion was pragmatic; he believed ‘most people need it’ because religion fosters submission to the principles and traditions on which civilisation depends. This focus on securing submission provided a bridge between neoliberal defences of the market and Catholic anti-totalitarianism. — Jessica Whyte, The Morals of the Market, 356 (#contradicts, via linked claim)

Categorization

• XREF: connects to: Hayek courted Christians as necessary allies for liberalism — Dieter Plehwe, Quinn Slobodian & Philip Mirowski (eds.), Nine Lives of Neoliberalism, 354; Hayek held that free markets require a moral culture of personal responsibility to survive — Jessica Whyte, The Morals of the Market: Human Rights…, 23; Hayek framed social rights demands as atavistic tribal regressions threatening civilization — Jessica Whyte, The Morals of the Market: Human Rights…, 30 (+4 more)

Related

• Hayek endorsed religious submission as a tool for market order despite his own agnosticism (similarity 0.91)
• Hayek framed social rights demands as atavistic tribal regressions threatening civilization (similarity 0.90)
• Hayek held that free markets require a moral culture of personal responsibility to survive (similarity 0.90)
• Hayek valued religion pragmatically for securing submission to market order (similarity 0.90)
• Hayek’s late work turned morality into a survival condition for civilized order (similarity 0.87)
• Hayek saw market society as requiring deliberate breach of tribal solidarity. (similarity 0.87)
• Hayek cast market progress as requiring the abandonment of tribal solidarity and egalitarian loyalties (similarity 0.86)
• Hayek’s market-morals argument drew on explicitly ethical justifications of capitalism. (similarity 0.85)
• Hayek extended Christian conscience freedom into economic freedom of individual judgment (similarity 0.85)
• Hayek held that only one moral system, the market’s, yields an open society. (similarity 0.83)
• Hayek courted Christians as necessary allies for liberalism (similarity 0.83)
• Hayek and fellow Mont Pèlerin founders viewed Christianity as indispensable to liberal revival (similarity 0.83)
• Hayek grounded the morals of the market in evolutionary selection, not natural rights. (similarity 0.83)
• Neoliberal theorists valued Christianity instrumentally for enforcing market submission, not from faith. (similarity 0.82)
• Neoliberals treated individual freedom as a moral principle yet sought reconciliation with religion (similarity 0.82)

Broader Connections

• Hayek framed social rights demands as atavistic tribal regressions threatening civilization #expands (0.80) — Jessica Whyte, The Morals of the Market, 30
• Hayek valued religion pragmatically for securing submission to market order #contradicts (0.72) — Jessica Whyte, The Morals of the Market, 356