This Is Neoliberalism

This is a great deep dive on neoliberalism.

Even though it is from a Left perspective, I agree with about 90% of it. It has taken me all evening to watch these four videos and ponder my response. I agree with the division of the 20th century and early 21st century into classical liberalism until the Crash of 1929, embedded liberalism from FDR through Carter and neoliberalism from Reagan through Trump.

I understand this is a work in progress, but throughout these videos little thought is given to the impact of neoliberalism on the Right which is psychologically predisposed to valuing hierarchy, authority, order and tradition. The Right is also “collectivist” in the sense that it values the health and stability of religion, our culture, the family, the nation, communities, etc. The overwhelming majority of rightwing voters are motivated by these sentiments, not by liberal abstractions which are fundamentally at odds with them.

The truly volcanic reaction against neoliberalism in Europe and North America is coming from the Right precisely because it is a solvent that is destroying all the things the Right cares about. The “spontaneous order” created by the radical individualism and price signals of the market in a neoliberal state which has been both culturally and economically deregulated has massively destabilized the social order and has generated an authoritarian populist response.

What happens when you deregulate marriage and the family? What happens when Christianity is deconstructed by a hostile elite that has come to control the mass media and the universities in Karl Popper’s Open Society? What happens when the borders of the nation are deregulated and opened up to an endless flow of Third World immigrants? When new genders are invented? These pillars of social stability in the West – religion, marriage, the family, the nation, community – have all been undermined by flows of labor and capital that has generated a transnational elite with no sense of loyalty to any particular place and which is only interested in enriching itself.

Neoliberalism has brought about decades of wage stagnation and enriched a tiny oligarchy, but the “spontaneous order” it has created has done far more damage to our culture than our economy. This is resented even more by the White middle class and working class than the economic side of it. While life sucks in Jeffrey Tucker’s soulless neoliberal consumer utopia, he isn’t wrong about the McDouble, Amazon Prime, Uber or the Samsung flatscreen television. Overall, life is more materially comfortable albeit unequal for the dispossessed under neoliberalism while it has grown staggeringly more culturally and psychologically uncomfortable. The GDP and Wall Street are doing great while suicides are at the highest level since the Great Depression.

This is the biggest problem with Left critiques of neoliberalism. They fail to see and appreciate the other side of the coin which is how our culture has been deregulated and the social order has been destabilized. In particular, they are blind to how mass immigration, cultural degeneration and political correctness are generating more resentment than economic inequality. Trump exploited this blind spot to become president and push neoliberal economics even further.

About Hunter Wallace 12379 Articles
Founder and Editor-in-Chief of Occidental Dissent

16 Comments

  1. Okay,there’s some truth here as well as some egregious lies. There’s no support for “fascism” from the corporate elite, quite the contrary. It seems to me that every Third Positionist ideology has been or is now being ruthlessly crushed. The reference to blompfismus as authoritarianism is laughable as well. They are every bit as Corporatist as the masters of the “Neo-Liberal” universe. These are my impressions from the first installment of this little series. I’ll try to contain my ire and watch the rest.

    • Great little essay; however, life is emphatically not more comfortable today than in the years following WW II, for example. In fact, it is no where near as comfortable. As Spengler put it, life, if it is to be good, must be hard, but even a modest roll back to basics will unleash human potential and happiness, not constrain it.

      If, as seems likely, the ‘leftists’ who now control social media, as they do the msm, pull the plug on dissent, their shortsightedness will cause men to associate in groups again and overwhelm the bastards like a brush fire sweeping through dry grass, as Homer put it.

      The Republicans and Conservatism Inc are our enemy as much as the patently evil Dems. Who needs further proof the former are granted existence to throw the game? Looking to them for leadership and a way out is worse than suicidal; it’s the cowards way out and almost guarantees what the ‘left’ did to sixty-plus million Christian Russians will happen here.

    • While that may be true, Spawn, I think HW has his pulse on the underlying supernatural reality.

      Everything that I value, can be labelled under the term ‘Right’ ….or a more conscious use of the English tongue, to be ‘conservative’- in everything, and not just politics: religion, all forms of tradition- dress, hair, food clothing, music, architecture, skirt lines, modesty, literature, cinema, art, ALL OF IT.

      As well, a true sense of and a hierarchically enforced moral order, leading to that most prized posession- cultural homogeneity- which leads to both civilizational stability and a sense of order, as well as allowing for true genius to flower; heteronormativity, because biblical; acknowledgment of perversion (sodomy) while strongly discouraging it, to enable such divided men to seek order and harmony in the midst of their temptations (the geniuses of old who did this are many, and would not have achieved such, had they merely been able to bugger indiscriminately- think of Wilde, Michaelangelo,Tchikovsky, etc.); Patriarchy, because women ARE the ‘lesser sex’ and 1) are to have men as heads over them, 2) if for no other reason that ‘God said so,’ but also 3) because of the vast amount of data that shows a feminist/psychologically inverted order, which ever leads to chaos, anarchy, whoredom (of both sexes), and utter annihilation of the ‘world’ as we know it.

      I think the ultimate issue is RELIGIOUS, as it has always been. The Left (because now led by the Talmudics) is the ‘Synagogue of Satan’ and the Right (because there is no other true moniker) is the Kingdom/Church of the Living God, Jesus Christ.

      And there is no neutrality. One is either for the one (and then, death as the outcome) or submits himself (and especially, herself) to Christ God and the Church and State working in Symphony.

  2. Neoliberalism might be described as a more moderate classical liberalism/libertarianism (in terms of economics). The ideologies are not synonymous since neoliberals support private central banking, corporate welfare, “free” trade, various pro-corporate regulation and taxation policies, etc. Neoliberalism is akin to corporate plutocracy, where the goal is a globally integrated market and where government power is used to grant special favors for corporations or wealthy individuals. So, for example, neoliberals supported the 2008 bailout of the banks. Libertarians did not. Neoliberals will tend to focus on tax cuts for the rich while libertarians will tend to focus on tax cuts for everyone (while not really opposing tax cuts for the rich in practice, believing any tax cut to be a good one).

  3. “Neo-liberal” was just a label slapped on to the New Democrats, starting with Carter but coming to power under Clinton/Gore, that decided to screw the labor unions and instead get funding from banks.

    “Neo-liberal” – meaning “new liberalism” – simply referred to “free trade” and global markets.

    But it’s not an “ideology.” It’s a label. There is nothing “free market” about any of it. If anything, it’s old-fashioned imperialism. It’s not like anyone says, “according to neo-liberal principles, we must do this, that and the other.”

    No. People do what they want to, then justify it using some appeals to “free trade” and “correcting inefficiencies in the labor market.”

    Was there anything “conservative” about “neo-conservative?” No. As one prominent Jewish neo-conservative said, in the term “neo-con” the “con” means “conservative” and the “neo” means “Jew.”

    Arguing over labels and ideologies is Wordism, as the late, great Bob Whitaker said. There is no such thing as a “free market.” Modern finance is a cartel and basically always has been. Libertarianism is a religion hardly different than orthodox Communism.

    “Markets” are a social construct. When people say “socialism” 90% of the time they really mean “capitalism with welfare” which really means “taxpayers subsidizing corporations.”

    People just get too hung up on the labels. Ignore what people say and focus on what they do.

    Invade Iraq for Israel, bomb and torture anyone who complains, then open up McDonalds and sign a contract with a Chinese oil company. What’s “neo-liberal” about any of that? What’s “free market” about any of that?

    If you want a more accurate word, try “organized crime.”

    • “If you want a more accurate word, try “organized crime.””

      I was thinking today that voting politcs is a waste of time, when the country is in reality run by an unelected Mafia, that we call donors/oligarchy.

      So if we can’t vote them out, how do we get rid of them?

      https://www.imdb.com/list/ls025787416/

    • Beautifully expressed Mr. Hipster. Exactly right in all particulars. Economic conservatism combined with social libertinism is the best of both worlds for the successful, because they keep more of the wealth generated while being able to indulge their depravities without fear of legal sanction or other consequences. For the rest, it is the worst, because no sharing of life’s risks is undertaken by a society controlled by accumulation, and the 99% cannot buy their way out of trouble caused by sex and drugs and rock-n-roll like the wealthy do. The reverse is best for the rest, as they get some help from society while not being tempted to engage in behavior that ruins lives. Economic collectivism, social conservatism. Which does not harm the Oligarchs, as they still are wealthy, and still can buy their way out of trouble caused by wokeness.

      • @J. R. Chloupek

        When I was a young man just starting my career, I realized very quickly that if anyone asked me anything political, there was only one response allowed: “I’m economically conservative but socially liberal.” I needed the money, so I said what I was told to say.

        But of course I’m actually the exact opposite: I want “economic collectivism, social conservatism,” just as you say.

        I’m fine with liberalism, but I know that liberalism is a White Privilege. ONLY White people can create liberal societies. No mixed-race societies can be liberal. As the Founding Father of Singapore, the great Lee Kuan Yew, said, “in multiracial societies, you don’t vote in accordance with your economic interests and social interests, you vote in accordance with race and religion.”

        You can’t have liberalism, or any liberty at all, in a multiracial society. ONLY white people – hell, perhaps even only Anglo people – are liberal.

        In a 100% White society where only men who are actively military/militia vote, democracy and liberalism would work damn near perfectly.

        • Ah yes, Lee Kuan Yew, next to the Kingfish my all-time favorite benevolent dictator, or truthfully, my favorite chief executives. Both fully realistic about their voters, but wanting nonetheless to use their power to help the less successful without taking the means for the genetically endowed to be successful. Lee Kuan started out a socialist but ended up fighting the communists for control of Singapore, then switched to a mixed economy political-economy with an emphasis on entrepreneurism and hard work combined with a risk sharing system called the Central Provident Fund, used for secondary education, housing, or retirement, and a cost-effective government medical system. If we can’t have Huey, I wish to God we could raise Lee Kuan Yew from the dead and install him as Boss for Life.

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