Book reviews: D. Cahill, The End of Laissez-Faire? The Durability of Embedded Neoliberalism

Authors

Scott Burrows, University of WollongongFollow

RIS ID

114444

Publication Details

Burrows, S. "Book reviews: D. Cahill, The End of Laissez-Faire? The Durability of Embedded Neoliberalism." Journal of Sociology 52 .4 (2016): 907-914.

Abstract

Neoliberalism is associated with a set of shared assumptions emphasising individualism, laissez-faire competition, private property rights and a belief that free capitalist expansion improves the prosperity and wellbeing of everyone. It is a well-critiqued ideology that has been identified since the 1970s, with a range of associated policies and practices such as deregulation, privatisation and smaller government. Through intellectual forums on the political Right (such as the Mont Pelerin Society), promotion by economist Milton Friedman, and association with the legacy of philosophers such as Friedrich Hayek, neoliberalism developed primarily in response to the crisis of profitability in the early 1970s that ended the post-Second World War ‘long boom’.