Hayek saw collectivist mass politics as the long-standing destroyer of free markets.
Evidence
In a foreword to the 1956 American edition of The Road to Serfdom the Austrian economist explained that the book aimed to show that state economic controls and public monopolies could destroy the market economy and ‘gradually smother the creative powers of a free civilization’. This threat, Hayek believed, long preceded the outbreak of World War II; everywhere, liberal ideals and free markets were threatened by the rise of collectivist mass politics, and only those who could remember the period before World War I knew what a liberal world was like. — Jessica Whyte, The Morals of the Market, 69
Categorization
- XREF: connects to: Wartime despair over collectivism’s ascendancy animated Hayek’s Road to Serfdom. — Angus Burgin, The Great Persuasion: Reinventing Free…, 203; Hayek preferred a liberal dictator over a democracy that impinges on markets — Jessica Whyte, The Morals of the Market: Human Rights…, 363; Hayek endorsed suspending freedom to preserve market institutions long-term — Jessica Whyte, The Morals of the Market: Human Rights…, 362 (+6 more)
Broader Connections
- Hayek preferred a liberal dictator over a democracy that impinges on markets
#expands(0.90) — Jessica Whyte, The Morals of the Market, 363 - Hayek endorsed suspending freedom to preserve market institutions long-term
#expands(0.85) — Jessica Whyte, The Morals of the Market, 362 - Hayek cast market progress as requiring the abandonment of tribal solidarity and egalitarian loyalties
#expands(0.85) — Jessica Whyte, The Morals of the Market, 29 - Hayek’s extended order subordinates political authority to market discipline
#expands(0.80) — Shoshana Zuboff, The Age of Surveillance Capitalism, 120 - Hayek’s pessimism about the present coexisted with long-term confidence in his ideas
#qualifies(0.80) — Angus Burgin, The Great Persuasion, 86 - Hayek framed social rights demands as atavistic tribal regressions threatening civilization
#exemplifies(0.80) — Jessica Whyte, The Morals of the Market, 30 - Hayek misattributed capitalism’s bureaucratization to foreign ideas rather than its internal dynamics.
#complicates(0.75) — Philip Mirowski & Dieter Plehwe (eds.), The Road from Mont Pèlerin, 392