Neoliberals sought enforceable capital flight rights that outstripped human rights protections.

Evidence

Defending the rights of the investor was an impor­tant early fight for neoliberal intellectuals and one they engaged in with their partners from the 1920s of the ICC. Although their campaign was framed as one for the sanctity of property rights, it is more accurately a fight for the sanctity of capital mobility. They ­were fighting, not for the right to own and stay, but for the right to sell and leave. In the aftermath of the Second World War, as international law was being rethought to accommodate the prob­lem of the stateless and the refugee, international economic law was being formulated to protect the rights of what one con­temporary called “refugee money” and the ­human right of capital flight. If, as historians argue, nobody believed that the ­human rights of the 1940s should be enforceable at the cost of state sovereignty, it is notable that many believed that the private rights of capital should be enforceable in exactly that way. — Quinn Slobodian, Globalists, 481

Categorization

• XREF: Connects to the book’s core thesis about neoliberalism as insulation of markets from democracy — the asymmetry between capital mobility rights and human rights enforcement is a sharp case. — connects to: Neoliberals redeployed human rights to protect investors and property — Jessica Whyte, The Morals of the Market: Human Rights…, 428; Neoliberals framed human rights as a tool to enforce global standards protecting private capital; Neoliberals weaponized human rights language to protect private property and market order — Jessica Whyte, The Morals of the Market: Human Rights…, 76 (+6 more)
• SEED: Angle for an essay: the 1940s parallel between the refugee (stateless person) and ‘refugee money’ — how the same decade that codified human rights for displaced people also codified capital flight as a human right.
• ADDENDUM: Directly supplements ‘On Sacrifice: The Real Kind, with Corpses’ only in the sense of rights frameworks — actually more relevant as a companion to the rights-vs-sovereignty tension discussed throughout the book.

Broader Connections

• Neoliberals redeployed human rights to protect investors and property #corroborates (0.90) — Jessica Whyte, The Morals of the Market, 428
• Neoliberals framed human rights as a tool to enforce global standards protecting private capital #corroborates (0.88)
• Neoliberals weaponized human rights language to protect private property and market order #corroborates (0.86) — Jessica Whyte, The Morals of the Market, 76
• Neoliberals deployed human rights language to justify property rights and dismantling welfare #corroborates (0.85) — Jessica Whyte, The Morals of the Market, 7
• Neoliberals saw human rights standards as a way to depoliticize international economic relations #expands (0.80) — Jessica Whyte, The Morals of the Market, 450
• Neoliberal ‘freedom’ prioritized cross-border capital mobility over domestic welfare. #corroborates (0.78) — Dieter Plehwe, Quinn Slobodian & Philip Mirowski (eds.), Nine Lives of Neoliberalism, 423
• Neoliberalism and human rights are commonly seen as opposing globalizing logics. #qualifies (0.75) — Jessica Whyte, The Morals of the Market, 39
• Neoliberals saw economic rights as a path toward totalitarianism #expands (0.75) — Jessica Whyte, The Morals of the Market, 163