Editing Neoliberalism (section)

== Early history ==

=== Walter Lippmann Colloquium ===
{{Main|Colloque Walter Lippmann}}
[[File:Graph charting income per capita throughout the Great Depression.svg|thumb|upright=1.15|Per capita income during the [[Great Depression]]<ref>International data from {{cite web |first=Angus |last=Maddison |author-link=Angus Maddison |title=Historical Statistics for the World Economy: 1–2003 AD |date=July 27, 2016 |url=http://www.ggdc.net/maddison/Maddison.htm}}. Gold dates culled from historical sources, principally {{Cite book |title=Golden Fetters: The Gold Standard and the Great Depression, 1919–1939 |author-link=Barry Eichengreen |first=Barry |last=Eichengreen |publisher=[[Oxford University Press]] |location=New York |year=1992 |isbn=978-0-19-506431-5 |url=https://archive.org/details/goldenfettersgol00eich}}</ref>]]

The [[Great Depression]] in the 1930s, which severely decreased [[economic output]] throughout the world and produced high [[unemployment]] and widespread [[poverty]], was widely regarded as a failure of [[economic liberalism]].<ref>{{cite web |last1=van Otten |first1=George |title=The End of Economic Liberalism |url=https://www.e-education.psu.edu/geog597i_02/node/767 |website=GEOG 597i: Critical Geospatial Thinking and Applications |publisher=Penn State Department of Geography |access-date=July 6, 2019}}</ref> To renew the damaged ideology, a group of 25 liberal intellectuals, including a number of prominent academics and journalists like [[Walter Lippmann]], [[Friedrich Hayek]], [[Ludwig von Mises]], [[Wilhelm Röpke]], [[Alexander Rüstow]], and [[Louis Rougier]], organized the [[Colloque Walter Lippmann|Walter Lippmann Colloquium]], named in honor of Lippmann to celebrate the publication of the French translation of Lippmann's pro-[[Market (economics)|market]] book ''An Inquiry into the Principles of the Good Society''.<ref name="NR-Colloqium">{{cite news |last1=Solow |first1=Robert M. |title=Hayek, Friedman, and the Illusions of Conservative Economics |url=https://newrepublic.com/article/110196/hayek-friedman-and-the-illusions-conservative-economics |access-date=August 14, 2019 |publisher=[[The New Republic]] |date=November 15, 2012}}</ref>{{sfnp|Burgin|2012|pp=[https://books.google.com/books?id=BnZ1qKdXojoC&pg=PA58 58–62]}} Meeting in Paris in August 1938, they called for a new liberal project, with "neoliberalism" one name floated for the fledgling movement.{{sfnp|Hartwich|2009|pp=18–19}} They further agreed to develop the Colloquium into a permanent think tank based in Paris called the Centre International d'Études pour la Rénovation du Libéralisme.{{sfnp|Burgin|2012|p=[https://books.google.com/books?id=BnZ1qKdXojoC&pg=PA56 56]}}

While most agreed that the ''[[status quo]]'' liberalism promoting ''laissez-faire'' economics had failed, deep disagreements arose around the proper role of the [[Government|state]]. A group of "true (third way) neoliberals" centered around Rüstow and Lippmann advocated for strong state supervision of the economy while a group of old school liberals centered around Mises and Hayek continued to insist that the only legitimate role for the state was to abolish barriers to market entry. Rüstow wrote that Hayek and Mises were relics of the liberalism that caused the Great Depression while Mises denounced the other faction, complaining that the [[ordoliberalism]] they advocated really meant "ordo-interventionism".{{sfnp|Hartwich|2009|pp=19–20}}

Divided in opinion and short on funding, the Colloquium was mostly ineffectual; related attempts to further neoliberal ideas, such as the effort by Colloque-attendee [[Wilhelm Röpke]] to establish a journal of neoliberal ideas, mostly floundered.<ref name="NR-Colloqium"/> Fatefully, the efforts of the Colloquium would be overwhelmed by the outbreak of [[World War II]] and were largely forgotten.<ref name="JACKSON p=129">{{cite journal |last=Jackson |first=Ben |title=At the Origins of Neo-Liberalism: The Free Economy and the Strong State, 1930–1947 |journal=[[The Historical Journal]] |volume=53 |issue=1 |date=January 29, 2010 |issn=0018-246X |doi=10.1017/s0018246x09990392 |pages=129–51 |s2cid=154994025}}</ref> Nonetheless, the Colloquium served as the first meeting of the nascent neoliberal movement and would serve as the precursor to the [[Mont Pelerin Society]], a far more successful effort created after the war by many of those who had been present at the Colloquium.{{sfnp|Stedman Jones|2014|p={{page needed|date=May 2023}}}}

=== Mont Pelerin Society ===
{{Main|Mont Pelerin Society}}
[[File:Friedrich Hayek portrait.jpg|thumb|upright|[[Friedrich Hayek]]]]
Neoliberalism began accelerating in importance with the establishment of the [[Mont Pelerin Society]] in 1947, whose founding members included [[Friedrich Hayek]], [[Milton Friedman]], [[Karl Popper]], [[George Stigler]] and [[Ludwig von Mises]]. Meeting annually, it became a "kind of international 'who's who' of the classical liberal and neo-liberal intellectuals."<ref>{{cite book |author=[[George H. Nash|Nash, George H.]] |title=The Conservative Intellectual Movement in America Since 1945, Thirtieth-Anniversary Edition |publisher=[[Intercollegiate Studies Institute]] |date=2006 |isbn=978-1-933859-12-5 |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=etQ6AwAAQBAJ |page=35}}</ref>{{sfnp|Mirowski|Plehwe|2009|p=5 |ps=: "The Mont Pèlerin Society and related networks of neoliberal partisan think tanks can serve as a directory of organized neoliberalism"}} While the first conference in 1947 was almost half American, the Europeans dominated by 1951. Europe would remain the epicenter of the community as Europeans dominated the leadership roles.{{sfnp|Mirowski|Plehwe|2009|pp=16–17}}

Established during a time when [[central planning]] was in the ascendancy worldwide and there were few avenues for neoliberals to influence policymakers, the society became a "rallying point" for neoliberals, as Milton Friedman phrased it, bringing together isolated advocates of liberalism and [[capitalism]]. They were united in their belief that individual freedom in the developed world was under threat from collectivist trends,{{sfnp|Stedman Jones|2014|p={{page needed|date=May 2023}}}} which they outlined in their statement of aims:
<blockquote>The central values of civilization are in danger. Over large stretches of the Earth's surface the essential conditions of human dignity and freedom have already disappeared. In others, they are under constant menace from the development of current tendencies of policy. The position of the individual and the voluntary group are progressively undermined by extensions of arbitrary power. Even that most precious possession of Western Man, freedom of thought and expression, is threatened by the spread of creeds which, claiming the privilege of tolerance when in the position of a minority, seek only to establish a position of power in which they can suppress and obliterate all views but their own...The group holds that these developments have been fostered by the growth of a view of history which denies all absolute moral standards and by the growth of theories which question the desirability of the rule of law. It holds further that they have been fostered by a decline of belief in private property and the competitive market...[This group's] object is solely, by facilitating the exchange of views among minds inspired by certain ideals and broad conceptions held in common, to contribute to the preservation and improvement of the free society.<ref>{{cite web |title=Statement of Aims |date=April 8, 1947 |url=https://www.montpelerin.org/statement-of-aims/ |website=The Mont Pelerin Society |access-date=July 16, 2019 |archive-date=October 14, 2021 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20211014133354/https://www.montpelerin.org/statement-of-aims/ |url-status=dead}}</ref></blockquote>

The society set out to develop a neoliberal alternative to, on the one hand, the ''laissez-faire'' economic consensus that had collapsed with the [[Great Depression]] and, on the other, [[New Deal]] liberalism and British [[social democracy]], collectivist trends which they believed posed a threat to individual freedom.{{sfnp|Stedman Jones|2014|p={{page needed|date=May 2023}}}} They believed that classical liberalism had failed because of crippling conceptual flaws which could only be diagnosed and rectified by withdrawing into an intensive discussion group of similarly minded intellectuals;{{sfnp|Mirowski|Plehwe|2009|p=16}} however, they were determined that the liberal focus on [[individualism]] and [[economic freedom]] must not be abandoned to collectivism.<ref>{{cite news |title=The birth of neoliberalism |url=https://www.economist.com/books-and-arts/2012/10/13/new-brooms |access-date=July 25, 2019 |publisher=[[The Economist]] |date=October 13, 2012}}</ref>