US strategy redefined Third World poverty as self-inflicted, defeating redistributive claims.

Evidence

Moynihan argued that the spontaneous ideology of Third Worldism was an inheritance of Fabianism. He laid out an oppositional strategy with three key ‘points of systematic attack’: defending liberal institutions, including ‘the most creative international institution of the twentieth century’, the multinational corporation; challenging the idea of a crisis in the Third World, pointing out that ‘these economies do less well than they ought: that the difference is of their own making and no one else’s, and no claim on anyone else arises in consequence’; and, following the lead of organisations like Amnesty International, ‘speaking for political and civil liberty’ with ‘enthusiasm and zeal’. — Jessica Whyte, The Morals of the Market, 425

Categorization

• XREF: This is the conservative counter-campaign against the NIEO/Third World demand for redistribution — connects to today’s analysis of how human-rights discourse was weaponized against economic-rights claims. — connects to: Humanitarian NGOs helped shift blame for poverty onto Third World states. — Jessica Whyte, The Morals of the Market: Human Rights…, 381; Humanitarian discourse relocated Third World poverty’s cause from colonialism to state leaders — Jessica Whyte, The Morals of the Market: Human Rights…, 437; Anti-Third-Worldist NGOs redirected blame for poverty onto postcolonial states themselves — Jessica Whyte, The Morals of the Market: Human Rights…, 391 (+2 more)
• SEED: Angles for an article: how Moynihan’s playbook prefigures modern conservative framing of poverty as self-inflicted — from ‘looting’ to ‘personal responsibility’ rhetoric about the Global South.

Broader Connections

• Humanitarian discourse relocated Third World poverty’s cause from colonialism to state leaders #corroborates (0.90) — Jessica Whyte, The Morals of the Market, 437
• Anti-Third-Worldist NGOs redirected blame for poverty onto postcolonial states themselves #corroborates (0.85) — Jessica Whyte, The Morals of the Market, 391
• Perceived Third World radicalism mobilized support for counter-revolutionary economics #qualifies (0.75) — Philip Mirowski & Dieter Plehwe (eds.), The Road from Mont Pèlerin, 1735
• The Third World debt crisis secured neoliberalism’s victory in development discourse #expands (0.72) — Philip Mirowski & Dieter Plehwe (eds.), The Road from Mont Pèlerin, 1816