The unknowability of the world economy drove neoliberal federalist reform
Evidence
Hayek began to realize in the 1930s that the dispersal of knowledge throughout an entire market economy was so complete that no individual could ever gain a functional overview of it. The shock of the 1930s brought with it the realization that the world economy was basically unknowable. Any task of reconstructing the relationship between the two worlds—of many nations and one economy—would have to be a project of redesigning the state and, increasingly after 1945, of redesigning the law. The essence of this project was multitiered governance or neoliberal federalism. — Quinn Slobodian, Globalists, 77
Categorization
- DEFINE: Introduces ‘neoliberal federalism’ / ‘multitiered governance’ as the core concept.
- XREF: Connects to Hayek’s knowledge problem as it appears in the Milgrom law-merchant reading on information costs. — connects to: Neoliberalism pivoted from the economy to the framework encasing it — Quinn Slobodian, Globalists: The End of Empire and the…, 88; Foucault’s account of neoliberalism missed its transnational and postnational dimensions — Wendy Brown, Undoing the Demos: Neoliberalism’s…, 144; Neoliberal freedom culminates in radical solipsism that denies the economy’s existence — Philip Mirowski, Never Let a Serious Crisis Go to Waste, 431 (+5 more)
Broader Connections
- Neoliberalism pivoted from the economy to the framework encasing it
#expands(0.85) — Quinn Slobodian, Globalists, 88 - Neoliberalism reframed politics as an epistemological question of what can be known
#complicates(0.85) — Dieter Plehwe, Quinn Slobodian & Philip Mirowski (eds.), Nine Lives of Neoliberalism, 54 - Foucault’s account of neoliberalism missed its transnational and postnational dimensions
#corroborates(0.80) — Wendy Brown, Undoing the Demos, 144 - Neoliberalism’s deliberate epistemic inconsistencies enabled its long-term success
#corroborates(0.80) - Neoliberal freedom culminates in radical solipsism that denies the economy’s existence
#expands(0.75) — Philip Mirowski, Never Let a Serious Crisis Go to Waste, 431 - Neoliberalism’s political strength partly derives from being poorly understood
#corroborates(0.75) — Philip Mirowski & Dieter Plehwe (eds.), The Road from Mont Pèlerin, 81