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Final Version Imagining Markets: The Discursive Politics of Neoliberalism P.W. Zuidhof Cover: Images with word clouds were generated using the following website: www.tagxedo.com and are licensed under the Creative Commons Attribution – Noncommercial – Share Alike License 3.0. The image on the front cover is generated from think tank materials referenced in appendix 4.1. The image on back cover is generated from advisory council reports referenced in appendix 5.1. Copyright © 2012 by P.W. Zuidhof Imagining Markets: The Discursive Politics of Neoliberalism Ingebeelde markten: de discursieve politiek van het neoliberalisme Proefschrift ter verkrijging van de graad van doctor aan de Erasmus Universiteit Rotterdam op gezag van de rector magnificus Prof.dr. H.G. Schmidt en volgens besluit van het College van Promoties. De openbare verdediging zal plaatsvinden op Vrijdag 27 januari 2012 om 9.30 uur Petrus Willem Zuidhof geboren te Pijnacker Promotiecommissie Promotor: Prof.dr. A. Klamer Overige leden: Prof.dr. M. de Goede Dr. W. Schinkel Prof.dr. E.M. Sent Source: Mick Stevens, The New Yorker, May 12, 2003, 39. To my parents Table of Contents List of Tables xi Acknowledgments xiii Introduction The Challenge of Neoliberalism 1 The Challenge of Neoliberalism 4 Neoliberalism as a Discursive Politics of the Market 7 Reading the Discursive Politics of Neoliberalism 12 Theorizing the Discursive Politics of the Market 18 Chapter One The ‘Modern’ Market 26 Introduction 26 The Centrality of the Market for Modern Political Thought 27 The Modern Image of the Market 42 Conclusion 60 Chapter Two The Governmental Science of Textbook Economics 64 Introduction 64 Textbook Economics 66 The Samuelsonian Textbook: A Classic Liberal Governmentality 70 Varieties of a Liberal Governmentality 81 Destabilizing the Modern Liberal Governmentality 97 Conclusion 108 Appendix 2.1: List of Textbooks Consulted 110 Chapter Three How to Do Things with Markets: What Neoliberalism Is (Not)? 118 Introduction 118 Neoliberalism: The Popular Narrative 119 Elusive Neoliberalism 123 A Neoliberal Governmentality 136 How to Do Things with Markets: The Discursive Politics of Neoliberalism 154 Conclusion 161 x Chapter Four The Discursive Market Politics of U.S. Policy Think Tanks 165 Introduction 165 Making Ideas Matter: A Normalizing Market Discourse 166 The Technocratic Market Discourse of the Brookings Institution 171 The Discourse of Competition at the American Enterprise Institute 177 The Discourse of Choice and Anti-Government at the Cato Institute 184 The Moral Market Discourse of The Heritage Foundation 192 Conclusion 200 Appendix 4.1: Primary Sources 205 Chapter Five Dealing with the Market: Dutch Neoliberal Discourse 209 Introduction 209 The Depoliticizing Market Discourse of Dutch Advisory Councils 211 Playing with the Discursive Politics of Neoliberalism 221 Coming to terms with Neoliberalism in the Netherlands 235 Conclusion 246 Appendix 5.1: List of Reports Consulted 251 Appendix 5.2: Frequency Distribution of Relevant Terms in Reports 252 Appendix 5.3: Summary of Reports Consulted 253 Conclusion Neoliberal Deconstructions 258 Imagining Markets 261 Neoliberalism as Deconstruction of Liberalism 262 The End of the State, But Not the End of Government 265 The End of the Market (As We Knew It) 270 Neoliberalism in More than One Country 275 The Attractions of Neoliberalism 279 Does Studying Economics Make You a Neoliberal? 283 The Futures of Neoliberalism 287 Nederlandse Samenvatting Ingebeelde Markten: De Discursieve Politiek van het Neoliberalisme 292 References 303 Curriculum Vitae P.W. (Peter-Wim) Zuidhof 322 List of Tables Table 2.1: Definitions of Market Failure 84 Table 2.2: The Principles of Economics 98 Table 2.3: Thinking like an Economist 101 Table 2.4: Varieties of a Liberal Governmentality 109 Table 4.1: Genres of Market Discourse at US Think Tanks 171 Table 4.2: The Discursive Market Politics of Four US Policy Think Tanks 202 Table 5.1: Summary of Research Questions of Dutch Advisory Reports 220 Table 5.2: Examples of Metonymic Slides in Dutch Advisory Reports 233 Table 5.3: The Discursive Market Politics 235 Table 5.4: Frequency Distribution of ‘Markt’ and ‘Marktwerking’ 237 Acknowledgments This thesis would never have been written without the generous support and help, both material and immaterial from many institutions and people. I cannot but start by thanking my advisor. Arjo Klamer has always been a great teacher who has been truly committed to my endeavors. Throughout the research for this thesis he stimulated me to develop the project as I saw fit. I think that it is no overstatement to say that I am close to un-supervisable, since I stubbornly insist on pursuing things my own way. While he must have struggled with that, he has tirelessly tried to move me ahead and managed, with a few important interventions, to get me to complete this piece of work. One thing I learned from Klamer is that the academic is personal and the personal is academic. While this thesis is unmistakably mine, I truly hope he recognizes something of himself and I am grateful for his support and insights throughout. Klamer possesses a remarkable intellectual spark, turning every conversation into an inquiry about how we live our lives. This conversational spirit is most clearly reflected in Klamer’s weekly seminar of which I had the privilege of participating in, on and off since 1996. I therefore also wish to thank all the participants of this very special and enduring institution, some of whom read and commented on parts of this thesis. I want to thank the following participants, Wilfred Dolfsma, Irene van Staveren, Onno Bouwmeester, Gjalt de Graaf, Anna Mignosa, Willem Schinkel, Rick Dolphijn, Bregje van Eekelen, Olav Velthuis, and Hans Abbing for all our conversations. I hope to continue my academic life in the spirit that was set by Klamer’s seminar. This thesis is the final product of a research program, titled “Images of markets: the rhetoric of markets,” which was financed by the Netherlands Organization for Scientific Research (NWO). The research was hosted by and conducted at the department of Arts and Culture Studies of the Erasmus School of History, Culture, and Communication. I thank the department for offering a hospitable home. The department and the Vereniging Trustfonds Erasmus Universiteit generously supported a research trip to the US, which was pivotal to this thesis. I want to thank my colleagues Ruth Towse, Suzanne Janssen, Ton Bevers, Filip Vermeylen, xiv Acknowledgments and Jacqueline van den Berkmortel, Theresa Oostvogels and Trees Ketting for their support. Sander Geenen skillfully helped negotiating the administrative procedures around the defense. Finally, I want to extend a special thanks to my fellow Ph.D. students, Paul Stepan and Alex van Venrooij for their company. I have received tremendous support from my newly acquired academic home at European Studies in the department of History, Archeology and Area Studies in the Faculty of Humanities of the University of Amsterdam. I greatly enjoy teaching and doing my research there, and hope to do so in the coming years. I want to especially thank Michael Wintle for his continuous support and for his trust in my work. I also want to thank Michael Kemper, Joep Leerssen, Anne van Wageningen and former colleagues, Marieke de Goede en André Gerrits for providing an inspiring environment for my work. Marleen Rensen and Carlos Reijnen deserve a special mention for making the impossible possible, making for a fun time during the 884-program meetings and more specifically for their support when I was finishing this thesis. I am grateful for the intellectual company of my fellow economists in the department. Peter Rodenburg read parts of the thesis and has always been readily available for valuable advice. Erwin Dekker and Paul Teule were excellent replacements in some of my courses and I have enjoyed our stimulating conversations about teaching economics, the history of economics, the euro-crisis, and many other topics. I also want to thank my friends at the History department, especially my former office-mate Michiel van Groesen and of course Guy Geltner. Finally, I want to thank Bart Jan Roffel and Sill de Bruijn for making my administrative duties more fun. At Amsterdam University College, I want to thank Louise Vigeant for being an understanding and humorous academic coordinator of the Social Sciences curriculum. Being a lecturer now myself, I know how gratifying it is to hear back from your students. I want to thank a number of my past professors, who taught me in so many ways how to become an academic. Although they may no longer recognize themselves in my work, they have led the way to where I am now. At the Erasmus University Rotterdam, I thank Albert Jolink, Jack Vromen, Hans Blom for the first stimulating courses in economics and philosophy and Albert Jolink for enabling an exchange to the University of Notre Dame. My stay there as an exchange student nourished my intellectual growth and I want to thank Phil Mirowski, Esther Mirjam Sent, and David Ruccio for their important contributions to my education. I thank Uskali Mäki for his invigorating contribution to the Erasmus Institute for Philosophy and Economics (EIPE) and for being the advisor of my MA. thesis. Among my professors, Deirdre McCloskey deserves a special mention. Ever since Acknowledgments xv her memorable stay in Rotterdam in 1995/1996, I have gotten to know her as uniquely amusing and devoted teacher, not least through the “Words of Science” course taught together with Uskali Mäki. Throughout my PhD. research she remained a tremendously inspiring source of intellectual joy. At the New School for Social Research, I want to thank Ernesto Laclau, Chantal Mouffe, Charles Taylor, Agnes Heller, Robin Blackburn, Jay Bernstein, Alan Bass, William Milberg and the late Jacques Derrida for teaching me how to engage in theoretical academic inquiry that is nonetheless closely in tune with the social world.
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