As I've said previously, his book on the strange non-death of Neoliberalism-or even much bruising, after the crisis of 2008-is a very interesting read. He has some very novel ways of looking at things with which he is trying to get out of the Neoliberal straitjacket.
http://www.amazon.com/Never-Serious-Crisis-Waste-Neoliberalism/dp/1781680795/ref=sr_1_1?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1379793508&sr=1-1&keywords=phillip+mirowski
One reason it's so difficult he thinks goes all the way back to Hayek's theory of the market as generator of Spontaneous Order. It's the idea where the market is all-knowing but individuals-no matter where they are situated; certainly according to SO being with the authorities in the government imparts to you no more wisdom and knowledge than elsewhere-ie, individuals are suffused with much ignorance.
He argues that part of the NL agenda is actually meant to broaden the ignorance of individuals. Interestingly a recent comment by dedicated Diary of a Republican Hater reader Greg touches on Mirowski's point. Or more like it, Greg gives us an example of Neoliberalism in action:
"Strangely enough though, I think the GOP strategy has worked beautifully."
"If you talk to most Americans they think our national debt and govt spending are out of control. They mostly have no clue about the debt ceiling other than there needs to be one. "How can you not put a limit on our national debt!!"
"The GOP is getting everything they want really. A sluggish economy, a president who's popularity is not high, nor do most people think he is the man for the job....... even though they cant agree about what exactly needs to be done."
"They all want more jobs, but less spending. More saving AND more investment spending (which of course is possible but not in the direction most people think ...... we must spend first to have something to save)."
"Monetarists are all through the Fed reserve and econ departments giving advice AND most democrats agree with our debt and deficits being a problem. "
http://www.amazon.com/Never-Serious-Crisis-Waste-Neoliberalism/dp/1781680795/ref=sr_1_1?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1379793508&sr=1-1&keywords=phillip+mirowski
One reason it's so difficult he thinks goes all the way back to Hayek's theory of the market as generator of Spontaneous Order. It's the idea where the market is all-knowing but individuals-no matter where they are situated; certainly according to SO being with the authorities in the government imparts to you no more wisdom and knowledge than elsewhere-ie, individuals are suffused with much ignorance.
He argues that part of the NL agenda is actually meant to broaden the ignorance of individuals. Interestingly a recent comment by dedicated Diary of a Republican Hater reader Greg touches on Mirowski's point. Or more like it, Greg gives us an example of Neoliberalism in action:
"Strangely enough though, I think the GOP strategy has worked beautifully."
"If you talk to most Americans they think our national debt and govt spending are out of control. They mostly have no clue about the debt ceiling other than there needs to be one. "How can you not put a limit on our national debt!!"
"The GOP is getting everything they want really. A sluggish economy, a president who's popularity is not high, nor do most people think he is the man for the job....... even though they cant agree about what exactly needs to be done."
"They all want more jobs, but less spending. More saving AND more investment spending (which of course is possible but not in the direction most people think ...... we must spend first to have something to save)."
"Monetarists are all through the Fed reserve and econ departments giving advice AND most democrats agree with our debt and deficits being a problem. "
I did contest the idea that there is no downside to GOP scorched earth obstruction. He agreed that they usually end up at some point paying a heavy political price but that these are more zealots than rational actors.
Yet, focusing on the American people, it's true that their understanding of so much is blinkered. They want so many incompatible things and believe so any contradictory things-the high-water mark for this was that Tea Party woman in 2010 who demanded that you keep your dirty government hands off of my Medicare!
,
Mirowski argues this is from design, the Neoliberal design-as I've explained in other posts regarding Mirowski's book, he traces NL back to Hayek, von Mises, Friedman and the Mt. Perelin Society (MPS)-a design to increase the ignorance of individuals while increasing the wisdom of the market as it were. .
To be sure many of us get that a big problem is the ignorance of people. How exactly is it achieved is a more difficult question. Mirowski argues one way to greatly increase ignorance is via agnotolgy. This is where you les try to convince someone that what they believe is definitely false and that your preferred answer is true but just increase the uncertainty about the rightness of what they believe.
The classic example in this is climate change. Simply increasing the uncertainty of whether or not climate change is real is a major goal of opponents of those who want new regulations and action in response to climate change.
So if I want to weaken the chance of action on climate change I don't welcome-maybe for ideological reasons or because it would harm my industry-I could practice a couple of different defenses; besides outright 'climate denialism' I could also pout out information that at least called the certainly of climate change into question.
Indeed a good method is to set up a think tank that provides both faulty, inaccurate research and accurate research at the same time. I notice that this is common. For example, if you were to assume that the quality of everything in Forbes is on the level of the stated beliefs of its owner Steve Forbes, you'd expect it all to be extreme Right wing libertarian. However, there is some level of diversity in Forbes, including some articles that suggest a more liberal bent and are of a higher quality.
I notice that even Cato doesn't publish only trash. On the immigration debate it's published a lot of quality work. The classic case of putting out both legitimate and illegitimate work is the Wall Street Journal where the journalistic part of the paper is largely at a very high level whereas the editorial page is often little more than yellow journalism. Though even here, not always. Again, agnotology keeps you guessing. If you read a couple of good articles at Cato, then you're more likely to somewhat take down your guard when reading them in the future even if the articles are in the more usual Cato mode-Right wing propaganda.
There is so much in Mirowski-I'm only about 50% done now. Again, I recommend it highly I have suggested in the past it may well be a Waite-y book-ie, it calls to mind Geoff Waite.
I'm about 50% through and he has gotten to a main point: that the only way out of Neoclassical econ is to abandon it entirely. He rejects the idea that it can be reformed from within. He uses the example of the EMH. Basically while many have come forward to argue that EMH can be slain, they are always actually unsuccessful-Stiglitz, Krugman, the behavioural economists
The reason for this he claims is that NC itself is suffused with EMH. Basically most critiques of EMH have come from within the NC establishment, ie, the goal is NC without EMH. However, in this case, Mirowski argues, we must throw out the baby with the bathwater if there's any hope of getting rid of zombie ideas like EMH.
He also provides an interesting history of NC-one thing that's lacking in NC he believes is any idea of the history of economic thought. Krugman himself has admitted to finding the subject totally uninteresting; one of the few exceptions I can think of is David Glasner who does have a healthy respect for-and knowledge of-the history of economic thought.
Accordng to Mirowski, the ubiquity of EMH in NC dates to Hayek's idea of SO and the debates over 'socialist calculation.' Interestingly then EMH actually has according to him an Austrian origin. This dates to about WWII. Prior to that, NC was mostly about the economics of scarcity rather than information.
I think I've left you more than enough to chew on for now. I will likely have more to say about Mirowski over time. Have a good Sunday and Go Giants!
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