Neoliberals appropriated the marketplace-of-ideas metaphor from their political enemies

Evidence

Hence, neoliberals felt compelled to contemplate organizing intellectual life in such a way that would respect their developing pro-market creed. They did so in a variety of ways, too many to discuss here. One of the most significant concerned the appropriation of the “marketplace of ideas,” a metaphor previously used by their political enemies to support robust democratic discussion, but now repurposed by neoliberals to rebut an ambition they increasingly regarded as dangerous. Beginning with Aaron Director, MPS members would with increasing frequency place intellectual, political, and trade concepts side by side in their work. Consequently, they came to explore the implications of the metaphor for organizing intellectual life more closely. — Dieter Plehwe, Quinn Slobodian & Philip Mirowski (eds.), Nine Lives of Neoliberalism, 102

Categorization

• XREF: Metaphor appropriation parallels how ‘free trade’ and other democratic-left tropes were captured; connects to ideas-are-infrastructure scholarship (informational capitalism). — connects to: Neoliberals have repeatedly appropriated left-wing ideas and twisted them to their own purposes. — Philip Mirowski, Never Let a Serious Crisis Go to Waste, 21; Neoliberals marketed the market as natural by borrowing early evolutionary science metaphors — Philip Mirowski & Dieter Plehwe (eds.), The Road from Mont Pèlerin: The Making…, 2127; Neoliberalism’s freedom ideology borrowed from fascist critics of liberalism — Philip Mirowski, Never Let a Serious Crisis Go to Waste, 234
• SEED: Angle: concept theft in political economy — how a metaphor built to justify democratic openness was inverted into a warrant for epistemic closure/elite control.
• corroborated: 2 independent passages support this claim — Dieter Plehwe, Quinn Slobodian & Philip Mirowski (eds.), Nine Lives of Neoliberalism, 102

Broader Connections

• Neoliberals marketed the market as natural by borrowing early evolutionary science metaphors #corroborates (0.78) — Philip Mirowski & Dieter Plehwe (eds.), The Road from Mont Pèlerin, 2127
• Neoliberalism’s freedom ideology borrowed from fascist critics of liberalism #corroborates (0.78) — Philip Mirowski, Never Let a Serious Crisis Go to Waste, 234