The Colloque Walter Lippmann convinced nascent neoliberals to cross disciplinary boundaries

Evidence

The Colloque Walter Lippmann helped spread the realization that honoring discrete academic disciplinary boundaries would probably hinder the project. The figures who gathered in 1938 saw the point of ranging widely over the traditional preserves of philosophy, politics, theology, and even the natural sciences. Neoliberals started to recognize the growing need “to organize individualism” in order to counter what was perceived as an unfortunate but irreversible politicization of economics and science (Zmirak 2001, 11). To achieve their goal of the “Good Society,” neoliberal agents agreed on the need to develop long-term strategies projected over a horizon of several decades, possibly to involve several generations of neoliberal intellectuals. No single genius or “saviour” would deliver the neoliberals into their Promised Land. — Philip Mirowski & Dieter Plehwe (eds.), The Road from Mont Pèlerin, 116

Categorization

• DEFINE: Introduces ‘organize individualism’ as a key neoliberal self-understanding and the long-horizon, multi-generational strategic orientation.
• XREF: Connects to the reader’s existing work on the neoliberal intellectual network’s origins; the 1938 gathering is a foundational event consigning the Colloque to Mont Pèlerin prehistory. — connects to: Lippmann’s 1937 Good Society launched the neoliberal program against Depression-era orthodoxy — Philip Mirowski & Dieter Plehwe (eds.), The Road from Mont Pèlerin: The Making…, 105; The term ‘neoliberalism’ was coined at the 1938 Colloque Walter Lippmann — Philip Mirowski & Dieter Plehwe (eds.), The Road from Mont Pèlerin: The Making…, 775; The Colloque first defined neoliberalism as framework-building rather than laissez-faire — Philip Mirowski & Dieter Plehwe (eds.), The Road from Mont Pèlerin: The Making…, 281 (+2 more)
• corroborated: 2 independent passages support this claim — Philip Mirowski & Dieter Plehwe (eds.), The Road from Mont Pèlerin: The Making…, 116

Broader Connections

• The Colloque first defined neoliberalism as framework-building rather than laissez-faire #expands (0.90) — Philip Mirowski & Dieter Plehwe (eds.), The Road from Mont Pèlerin, 281
• The term ‘neoliberalism’ was coined at the 1938 Colloque Walter Lippmann #expands (0.85) — Philip Mirowski & Dieter Plehwe (eds.), The Road from Mont Pèlerin, 775
• The Colloque Lippmann was an exclusionary gathering that seeded Europe’s postwar liberal establishment #qualifies (0.75) — Philip Mirowski & Dieter Plehwe (eds.), The Road from Mont Pèlerin, 277
• Neoliberalism’s cohesion comes from thought-collective structure, not explicit doctrine #complicates (0.75) — Philip Mirowski, Never Let a Serious Crisis Go to Waste, 916