Neoliberal-corporate relations defy both independence and instrumentality framings

Evidence

Recent scholarship has clarified the character of business relations of Mont Pèlerin intellectuals in the UK (Rollings, forthcoming), which is highly welcome material to further examine the relations between Mont Pèlerin, business interests, and struggles within the bourgeoisie, for example. Neither “independence” nor simple “instrumentality” will help to better explain the complicated relations between neoliberals and corporate interests. The strategic payoffs as well as the limits of the relations between neoliberals and capitalists should be more carefully explored. — Philip Mirowski & Dieter Plehwe (eds.), The Road from Mont Pèlerin, 31

Categorization

• DEEPTHINKING: The rejection of both ‘independence’ and ‘instrumentality’ as adequate frames for the neolib-corporate relationship is a genuinely paradigm-shifting methodological stance about how to model intellectual-capital alliances.
• QUESTION: Worth chasing: what third frame actually explains the neolib-capital relation if both independence and instrumentality fail?
• SEED: Angles for an essay: mapping the specific strategic payoffs AND constraints of think-tank-corporate alliances, against the common capture/revolving-door narrative.
• XREF: connects to: Corporate outsourcing and CEO pay inflation stem from neoliberal theory, not efficiency — Philip Mirowski, Never Let a Serious Crisis Go to Waste, 175; Neoliberalism’s legal framing unified economists and corporate managers — Philip Mirowski & Dieter Plehwe (eds.), The Road from Mont Pèlerin: The Making…, 282; Neoliberal university governance subordinates academic freedom to institutional transactions — Wendy Brown, Undoing the Demos: Neoliberalism’s…, 663 (+1 more)