Table Of ContentBirch&My 01 10/6/10 13:21 Page i
The Rise and Fall
of Neoliberalism
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About the Editors
Kean Birch is a lecturer in the Department of Geography
and Sociology at the University of Strathclyde. Previously
he was a research fellow in the Centre for Public Policy
for Regions at the University of Glasgow. His main
research interests concern the social and geographical
basis of different economies and especially the implica-
tions that new knowledge, science and technologies have
for these economies. He teaches courses on globalization,
neoliberalism and knowledge-based economies.
Vlad Mykhnenko is a research fellow in the School of Geog-
raphy at the University of Nottingham. Previously he was
a research fellow in the Centre for Public Policy for
Regions at the University of Glasgow, before acting as an
international policy fellow at the Central European Uni-
versity and Open Society Institute, Budapest. His research
interests broadly include critical political economy, post-
communist transformations, and European urban and
regional studies. He teaches courses on European regional
geographies and countries in transition.
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The Rise and Fall
of Neoliberalism
The Collapse of an Economic Order?
Edited by
Kean Birch and Vlad Mykhnenko
Zed Books
LONDON & NEW YORK
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The Rise and Fall of Neoliberalism: the Collapse of an Economic Order? was first published
in 2010 by Zed Books Ltd, 7 Cynthia Street, London N1 9JF, UK and
Room 400, 175 Fifth Avenue, New York, NY 10010, USA
www.zedbooks.co.uk
Editorial Copyright © Kean Birch and Vlad Mykhnenko 2010
Copyright in this collection © Zed Books 2010
The rights of Kean Birch and Vlad Mykhnenko to be identified as the editors of this
work have been asserted by them in accordance with the Copyright, Designs and
Patents Act, 1988
Designed and typeset in Great Britain by Long House Publishing Services
Index by John Barker
Cover designed by David Bradshaw
Printed and bound in Great Britain by CPIAntony Rowe,
Chippenham and Eastbourne
Distributed in the USA exclusively by Palgrave Macmillan, a division of St Martin’s
Press, LLC, 175 Fifth Avenue, New York, NY 10010, USA
All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval
system or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic, mechanical,
photocopying or otherwise, without the prior permission of Zed Books Ltd.
A catalogue record for this book is available from the British Library
Library of Congress Cataloging in Publication Data available
ISBN 978 1 84813 348 8 hb
ISBN 978 1 84813 349 5 pb
ISBN 978 1 84813 350 1 eb
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Contents
ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS vii
ABOUT THE CONTRIBUTORS viii
INTRODUCTION• A World Turned Right Way Up 1
KEAN BIRCH AND VLAD MYKHNENKO
PART ONE • THE RISE OF NEOLIBERALISM 21
1 How Neoliberalism Got Where It Is: Elite Planning, 23
Corporate Lobbying and the Release of the Free Market
DAVID MILLER
2 Making Neoliberal Order in the United States 42
KEAN BIRCH AND ADAM TICKELL
3 Neoliberalism, Intellectual Property and the Global 60
Knowledge Economy
DAVID TYFIELD
4 Neoliberalism and the Calculable World: the Rise of 77
Carbon Trading
LARRY LOHMANN
5 Tightening the Web: the World Bank and Enforced 94
Policy Reform
ELISA VAN WAEYENBERGE
6 The Corruption Industry and Transition: Neoliberalizing 112
Post-Soviet Space?
ADAM SWAIN, VLAD MYKHNENKO AND SHAUN FRENCH
7 Remaking the Welfare State: from Safety Net 133
to Trampoline
JULIE MACLEAVY
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PART TWO • THE FALL OF NEOLIBERALISM 151
8 Zombieconomics: the Living Death of the Dismal 153
Science
BEN FINE
9 From Hegemony to Crisis? The Continuing Ecological 171
Dominance of Neoliberalism
BOB JESSOP
10 Do It Yourself: a Politics for Changing Our World 188
PAUL CHATTERTON
11 Dreaming the Real: a Politics of Ethical Spectacles 206
PAUL ROUTLEDGE
12 Transnational Companies and Transnational 222
Civil Society
LEONITH HINOJOSA AND ANTHONY BEBBINGTON
13 Defeating Neoliberalism: a Marxist Internationalist 239
Perspective and Programme
JEAN SHAOUL
CONCLUSION• The End of an Economic Order? 255
VLAD MYKHNENKO AND KEAN BIRCH
INDEX 269
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Acknowledgements
We would like to thank the Economic and Social Research Council
(ESRC) for funding the seminar series titled ‘Neoliberalism, anti-
neoliberalism and de-ideologisation’ (RES-451-25-4258) from which
these chapters are drawn. We would also like to thank our ex-
colleague and co-organizer of the seminar series Katherine Trebeck
for her help and advice during the editing process. Further thanks to
all the contributors for their forbearance, including to those who
withdrew, and to the editors at Zed Books, Ellen Hallsworth and
Ken Barlow.
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About the Contributors
Anthony Bebbington is professor in the School of Environment and
Development, University of Manchester, an ESRC professorial fellow,
and research associate of the Centro Peruano de Estudios Sociales.
Paul Chatterton is a writer, researcher and scholar-activist based in the
School of Geography at the University of Leeds.
Ben Fine is professor of economics at the School of Oriental and
African Studies, University of London.
Shaun French is lecturer in economic geography at the University of
Nottingham.
Leonith Hinojosa is researcher and fellow lecturer at the School of
Environment and Development in the University of Manchester,
faculty associate in the Brooks World Poverty Institute and research
fellow in the Impact Assessment Research Centre.
Bob Jessop is distinguished professor of sociology and co-director of
the Cultural Political Research Centre at Lancaster University.
Larry Lohmann is an activist based at The Corner House, a UK non-
governmental organization.
Julie MacLeavy is a lecturer in human geography in the School of
Geographical Sciences at the University of Bristol.
David Miller is professor of sociology in the Department of Geography
and Sociology at the University of Strathclyde.
Paul Routledge is a reader in human geography at the Department of
Geographical and Earth Sciences at the University of Glasgow.
Jean Shaoul is professor of public accountability at Manchester Busi-
ness School.
Adam Swain is an associate professor of economic geography at the
School of Geography, University of Nottingham.
Adam Tickellis vice principal at Royal Holloway, University of London.
David Tyfield is a lecturer at the Centre for Mobilities Research
(CeMoRe), Sociology Department, Lancaster University.
Elisa van Waeyenbergeis a lecturer in the Economics Department at the
School of Oriental and African Studies, University of London.
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INTRODUCTION • A World Turned Right Way Up
KEAN BIRCH AND VLAD MYKHNENKO
Writing about neoliberalism in 2010 is a challenge. On the one
hand, the credit crunch and banking crisis have exposed the fault
lines in the neoliberal economic order that has been dominant for
the last three decades: Margaret Thatcher’s confident assertion that
‘there is no alternative’ springs to mind here. On the other hand,
the different impacts and implications of the recent economic crises
illustrate the diversity in the implementation and embeddedness of
neoliberalism in many countries, thereby suggesting that neo-
liberalism is not (and never was) a single hegemonic system in the
first place. Such a challenge, however, represents an opportunity to
further our understanding of neoliberal economic order(s) and how
this order grew to such prominence and held sway over national and
international policy for so long. According to David Harvey (2006),
neoliberalism has failed even to come close to, let alone achieve, the
growth rates of the golden age of Keynesianism (1960s), which raises
a serious question about how it has maintained legitimacy in the
face of its own failed raison d’être – to ensure wealth for all through
market efficiency. Thus it is pertinent to consider the core contra-
diction underpinning the seeming collapse of neoliberalism: the
extent to which the current crisis is tied to the very foundations on
which neoliberalism was built, namely the expansion of finance
capitalism and the associated housing and stock market booms of
the 1990s and 2000s.
There is a terrible irony in the fact that neoliberal policies of
privatization, marketization and liberalization over the last thirty
years have produced proceeds with a monetary value (€1.3 trillion)
that is only twice the recent bank bail-outs by the US and European
governments (see Hall 2008: 6), a fact that can be lost in the soul-
searching of mainstream commentators. Furthermore, government
