America and the West Reconsider Neoliberalism

The Senator Warning Democrats of a Crisis Unfolding Beneath Their Noses
https://www.nytimes.com/2024/08/19/opinion/chris-murphy-democrats.html
James Pogue:
America’s leaders — from both parties — have long been guided by what’s often called the neoliberal consensus: the idea that “barrier-free international markets, rapidly advancing communications technology and automation, decreased regulation and empowered citizen-consumers would be the keys to prosperity, happiness and strong democracy,” as Mr. Murphy put it. More simply, it’s a shared assumption that what’s good for markets is good for society.
This assumption shapes our politics so deeply that it’s almost invisible. But the idea that modern life is a story of constant economic and technological progress steadily making the world a better place has stopped lining up with how Americans feel. You can look at statistics about suicide, depression, overdoses and declining life expectancy. You can point to the fact that roughly 70 percent of wild animals on Earth have disappeared since 1970 or examine the astonishingly pervasive sense of loneliness that now seems to color so many American lives. But no statistics really capture the feeling, shared by growing numbers of Americans, that the world is just getting worse.

Neoliberalism Worked Pretty Well, Actually

https://www.bloomberg.com/opinion/articles/2024-06-10/bidenomics-neoliberalism-worked-pretty-well-actually
ALLISON SCHRAGER:
Neoliberalism does not mean a strict adherence to free markets, the abolition of state intervention and a cult-like devotion to Milton Friedman. Yes, beginning in the 1970s, there was a general decrease in marginal tax rates, an increase in free-trade agreements, and easier flows of international capital. The so-called “Washington consensus,” fostered by institutions such as the International Monetary Fund, preached the benefits of less debt, more trade and reduced government intervention.
But it’s not as if the whole world listened. The number of regulations ballooned in the last several decades, as did debt in many rich countries. It is better to think of neoliberalism, as my Bloomberg Opinion colleague Clive Crook has noted, as an acceptance that market prices convey valuable information; that people respond to incentives; that resources are limited; and, above all, that policies involve tradeoffs.

The Rise and Fall of Neoliberalism
https://www.newyorker.com/magazine/2023/07/24/the-rise-and-fall-of-neoliberalism
The free market used to be touted as the cure for all our problems; now it’s taken to be the cause of them.
 
The End of Globalization
https://www.newstatesman.com/world/2023/07/the-end-of-globalisation
 
Economists Reconsider Industrial Policy
https://www.project-syndicate.org/commentary/new-economic-research-more-favorable-to-industrial-policy-by-dani-rodrik-et-al-2023-08 

The Evolution of Modern Political Power
https://www.project-syndicate.org/onpoint/evolution-modern-political-power-states-capital-experts-labor-by-jonathan-ira-levy-2023-10
From the rise of large, bureaucratic states in the early twentieth century to the triumph of neoliberalism more recently, shifts in governance models cannot simply be reduced to the natural political instincts of those who find themselves in power at any given moment. There are much larger, and subtler, dynamics at work.

What’s Happening in Germany Reveals the Strange State of the Left
https://www.nytimes.com/2023/10/27/opinion/germany-leftist-populist-party-wagenknecht.html

Related:

https://www.newstatesman.com/comment/2023/10/sahra-wagenknechts-new-left-populist-party-should-be-taken-seriously