Neoliberalism cemented its hegemony by attacking paternalism as obsolete

Evidence

One of the ways in which neoliberal hegemony has cemented itself is by an attack on paternalism, because it’s saying paternalism is part of this obsolete, bureaucratic, centralising, top-down, archaic world that we’re glad to be rid of. What’s involved in paternalism? Paternalism is other people telling you what you ought to do, and we — we neoliberals — don’t believe in that; we believe that you should be able to choose for yourselves. Now this whole way of setting things up has, I think, been highly successful and for that reason deeply pernicious. — Mark Fisher (edited by Darren Ambrose), K-Punk, 2167

Categorization

• XREF: Connects to Fisher’s wider critique of neoliberal ideology and to cultural-decline narratives; also parallels the ‘complaints about immodesty’ pattern of moral framing serving political interests. — connects to: Neoliberalism has ended as a hegemonic project despite institutional persistence — Mark Fisher (edited by Darren Ambrose), K-Punk: The Collected and Unpublished…, 1840; Neoliberal paternalism in welfare traces back to 1930s European neoliberals, not 1980s social conservatism — Jessica Whyte, The Morals of the Market: Human Rights…, 216; Neoliberal choice confines people to versions of past selves; paternalism enables new selves — Mark Fisher (edited by Darren Ambrose), K-Punk: The Collected and Unpublished…, 599 (+3 more)
• QUESTION: Worth chasing: what concrete mechanisms made the anti-paternalism attack so successful? Fisher gestures at an answer later in the passage that he leaves underdeveloped.

Broader Connections

• Neoliberal choice confines people to versions of past selves; paternalism enables new selves #complicates (0.80) — Mark Fisher (edited by Darren Ambrose), K-Punk, 599
• Neoliberal paternalism in welfare traces back to 1930s European neoliberals, not 1980s social conservatism #complicates (0.78) — Jessica Whyte, The Morals of the Market, 216
• Early neoliberals framed welfare dependency as a degrading threat to human dignity #expands (0.74) — Jessica Whyte, The Morals of the Market, 176
• Neoliberalism reflated the autonomous individual to break social democratic collectivism #expands (0.72) — Mark Fisher (edited by Darren Ambrose), K-Punk, 1944
• Neoliberalism’s durability rests on fusing the economic with the cultural #qualifies (0.72) — Philip Mirowski, Never Let a Serious Crisis Go to Waste, 298