Watching from a far (The Netherlands), it always amazed me how the political scale in the US is described. Even the democrats in the US feel more to the right, then positioned in the US. Some people go as far to call democrats communist, but I don't think these people know what communist really is, in the same way that Americans don't seem to know what (neo)liberal actually is. It is both entertaining and concerning to watch.
Yeah, the idea that Democrats are center-left is hilarious - by the standards in most of Europe, they're not even center-right, just plain rightwing, whilst the Republicans are pretty much far-right (given their heavy religious, ultra-nationalis, anti-immigrant and warmongering - amongst others - rethoric).
The Overtoon Window has moved to the Right everywhere but in the US it did way much further than in most of Europe.
As for the whole neoliberalism stuff, it's pretty easy to spot the neoliberal parties even when they've disguised themselves as leftwing or (genuine) conservatives: they're the ones always obcessing about what's good for businesses whilst never distinguishing between businesses which are good for people and society and those which aren't: in other words, they don't see businesses (and hence what's "good for businesses") as a means to the end of being "good for people" (i.e. "good for businesses which are good for people hence good for people") but as an end in itself quite independently of what that does for people.
You need to understand, our two party system is not part of the actual government as it was designed. They are basically a pack of oligarchs running a good cop-bad cop routine on the electorate.
Our voting system naturally favors this dynamic. Anywhere you see "first past the post", ask if the people feel like they're voting for the leaders they'd prefer, or against the candidates that scare them the most. Oligarchic duopoly is the dominant game theoretic strategy inherent to FPTP.
I actually come from a country with a mathematically rigged voting system (not quite as much as the US, but still the current guys in power got 41% of votes and have an absolute parliamentary majority with 52% of parliamentary representatives) but lived for almost a decade in The Netherlands (which has Proportional Vote) as well as about the same in the UK (which is more like the US in that regard than the rest of Europe) and my impression is that there are 2 things pushing that dynamic in countries with such rigged voting systems vs the ones with Proportional Vote like The Netherlands:
Most of our Dems voted to make it illegal for rail workers to strike.
I think our country is starting to look like the US more and more which is scary.
Yeah agreed. Last elections I wasn't really sure what to vote on anymore, the political landscape is becoming to extreme for my taste. There are virtually no center parties anymore, especially when you exclude the religious related parties. With the recent election and the debates, the media is also trying to create a left versus right, which is a very strange thing to do in our system.
In the end, it would be nice to just have a government that cares about its people and future, they have made way too many mistakes over the past decade, mistakes that were avoidable if only they had listened. Cases in point: reversing the student grant system, pushing important government tasks to local governments (while reducing their budget) and the whole childcare debacle. Literally for all of these f*ups, the government was warned by experts...
The thing to get about deregulation in this context is that it's a misleading term- 'deregulation' doesn't mean un-doing regulation, it means handing regulatory authority over from democratically-accountable regulators, to private regulators that are less-accountable and often have interests at odds with those of the public.
In feudal times, regulation of trade or business was left to trade associations or guilds (who got to write their own rules that were typically rubber-stamped by the local nobility's younger son) and that system more or less translated into today's modern republics, up until the guilds and trade associations became trusts and monopolies. When the democratic regulatory state emerged to regulate spheres of business like banking and polluting industry because private regulators shat the bed, that was a shot in a war that the old guard business elites haven't stopped fighting- they saw this as a taking of their power, and have sustained decades of effort to hand public authority back over to private trade associations
It almost feels like political labels are there to deceive and confuse people or the political science is a meme that can't be trusted to name things. I swear, majority of political conflict is just people misunderstanding each other.
I'm writing a thesis that has significant support that the United States is and has, with the exception of about 30 years of progressive policy, been a plutocracy. The divisions in put country are by design. Division among racial lines, political affiliation, religious affiliation, professions, etc. are used to prevent the unification of the laboring class and dissuade us from collectively recognizing and challenging the status quo. The working people of this country have far more in common than not, but the political and moneyed class sow division via these wedge issues to prevent radical change - which would likely shift the US toward Scandinavian style social democracy.
So, while you're 100% correct about neoliberalism not belonging to either the left or the right, your basic description of neoliberalism isn't correct. What you describe (deregulation, positive valuation of wealth generation, free markets, etc) is just liberal capitalism.
Neoliberalism names the extension of market-based rationalities into putatively non-market realms of life. Meaning, neoliberalism is at play when people deploy cost/benefit, investment/return, or other market-based logics when analysing options, making decisions, or trying to understand aspects of life that aren't properly markets, such as politics, morality/ethics, self-care, religion, culture, etc.
A concrete example is when people describe or rationalize self-care as a way to prepare for the workweek. Yoga, in this example, becomes of an embodiment of neoliberalism: taking part in yoga is rationalized as an investment in self that results in greater productivity.
Another example: how it seems that most every public policy decision is evaluated in terms of its economic viability, and if it isn't economically viable (in terms of profit/benefit exceeding cost/investment) then it is deemed a bad policy. This is a market rationality being applied to realms of life that didn't used to be beholden to market rationalities.
Hence the "neo" in "neoliberalism" is about employing the logics of liberalism (liberal capitalism, I should say) into new spheres of life.
A good (re)source for this would be Foucault's Birth of Biopolitics lectures, which trace the shift from Liberalism to Neoliberalism. As well, there's excellent literature coming out of anthropology about neoliberalism at work in new spheres, in particular yoga, which is why I used it as my example here.
Globalized trade is good actually
Globalized trade has been a thing long before neo-liberalism existed, arguably longer than capitalism has existed. Equating neo-liberalism with "global/globalized trade" is incredibly reductive..
I didn't see that comment as reductive. More like pointing out a part of neo-liberalism that the commenter thought was good.
In other words, the comment is simply "globalized economy is good." The comment is not what you're inferring: "neo-liberalism is good because globalized economy is good "
Yes this is actually what I meant.
I do not subscribe to neoliberal economics- if anything I'm just left of the average Keynesian.
Thank you for clearifying, I have misinterpreted your comment in that case.
I love how civil everyone is being! And I appreciate that you edited your earlier comment.
Much more than globalized trade, globalized sharing of knowledge, awareness and circumstance - perhaps even globalized power, one day. The fight against capitalism will definitely require a great plan to take global communication away from private capital.
Yep, the best way to prevent rich powerful assholes from getting us into huge wars is to make it extremely unprofitable. Don't want to kill your market or labor force. Don't want to disrupt your supply chain. Etc.
Literally the Ukraine war is an excellent example of this. Second most powerful army in the world fighting a much smaller and poorly equipped army. Now only the second most powerful army in Russia.
I wouldn't say an army with airforce, patriots, himars, bunch of javelins and now western tanks is poorly equipped.
With the exception of the air force, most of this stuff came after Russia began the invasion in 2014. The Ukranian Air Force, absent support from allies, is actually kind of a liability since it's largely Mikhoyan and Sukhoi materiel where the maintenance, modernization, and operational expertise is concentrated in Russia. Ukraine basically had to invent its own supply chain from scratch.
centre-left
This is misleading. Neoliberalism is inherently capitalist, not socialist/communist.
All left-right political terminology is inherently subjective, so you can argue neoliberalism is promoted by center-left parties as long as you're defining the center as being to the right of that. Since this post seems to be about the United States, that center is already pretty far to the right as measured from, say, Denmark (picked a name out of a hat). I think the bigger argument here is about US-defaultism rather than whether or not it's OK for Americans to describe things in terms that relate to their political climate.
EDIT: I think the comment I'm replying to is confusing people. Replying solely to the words "center-left" makes it seem like the OP described neoliberalism as center-left, which people are objecting to. However, the OP only used the phrase center-left once, to say that American center-right and center-left parties have enacted neoliberal policy. As a statement of fact, the Democrats have enacted neoliberal policy. By American standards, the Democrats are regarded as center-left. This does not mean the OP was saying "neoliberalism is a center-left ideology." There is an argument to be made here that the Democrats are not a center-left party, but I think the issue is getting confused here because people are reacting as if the thing being described as "center-left" is neoliberalism, when it's actually the Democratic Party.
What you said makes zero sense. Neoliberalism is distinctly NOT a left wing ideology. To even try and associate them makes you look like you don't know what you're talking about.
Can we not bring this energy over from Reddit? You're arguing with something I didn't even say. We both agree, neoliberalism is not a left wing ideology. I didn't say that, the OP didn't say that, I don't know who you're even talking to with that remark.
What the OP said is that American center-left and center-right parties have both been proponents of neoliberalism. The only part of this that's remotely controversial is whether it's accurate to describe any American political parties as "center-left". From a global perspective, you can easily argue that that's not accurate. Go for it. From an American perspective, there are parties who are to the left of the (American) center. The Democrats are both center-left from the American perspective and proponents of neoliberalism. To restate: That does not mean that neoliberalism is a center-left or any other kind of leftist ideology. It only means what it says.
Dude, you quoted a single word out from OP and somehow even got that wrong. Which makes me think you're being deliberately obtuse.
OP wrote about "center-left" -- the American spelling. So it's clear that OP was discussing neo-liberalism from an American point of view. And in American politics, neo-liberalism is absolutely a component of center-left politics.
Sorry if this sounds angry. I get frustrated at the constant reframing of American politics under international standards. Yes, Americans lack a true leftwing in our politics. That's well established at this point. Nitpicking language around "American left" vs "international left" derails real discussion and is not helpful.
Yeah, and it sucks. Eff the neoliberals. All my homies hate neoliberals.
It's kinda sad how classical social democracy is basically dead nowadays. Here in Europe they are almost all neoliberals and some (like in Denmark) even start to mix this with right wing social policies.
Slightly OT comment from me, so sorry.
Take Jordan for example, a county being ruined day after day by neoliberal policies and ruthless privatization.
It's good to read what neoliberalism has done to some country in practice: https://www.iai.it/en/pubblicazioni/jordans-protests-and-neoliberal-reforms-walking-thin-ice
Take the US for example with crippling student loan debt.
Guess trade school wasn't such a failure after all.
ELI5: The difference between neoliberal (as defined above) and libertarianism.
Neoliberalism is more focused on free trade and globalism, whereas libertarianism focus more on individual liberties and minimal governmental intervention in all aspects of society, not just economically.
Sorry if that's not ELI5, but that's the gist.
Right-wing libertarians (this is another term with two very different meanings) are neoliberal absolutists. Center-right and center-left politicians usually have to compromise with other sets of ideals. Marijuana decriminalization and legalization is one area where right-wing politicians typically preference the social conservative side over the neoliberal/libertarian side. For a center-left example look at the Affordable Care Act. From the beginning Obama was never going to favor a true nationalized health care plan. He offered compromises within the existing framework like state exchanges.
On the ACA, basing it off of Romney-care was the most "no feathers to be ruffled here" play Obama could have made for such a system. Funnier still, I believe Romney got that plan handed to him by The Heritage Foundation. It would only take the "Dem" side of the coin proposing it for it to be labeled as communism coming for America.
Here's a good short article about neoliberalism that helps distinguish it from libertarianism.
In short, I'd say libertarians view free markets as an end in themselves; and neoliberals view free markets as a powerful means to generate wealth and prosperity, but are realistic about the needs for state intervention either to address market failures or to distribute the wealth created (which, as the article notes, is something markets aren't always good at).
YSK that anyone trying to generalize your political preferences into a singular term is propaganda. FTFY
Review the people you intend to vote for and see what their votes were on important issues.
Sheep hear these terms from talking heads on tv and radio. Those talking heads don't know and/or don't care what those terms actually mean. They only care that the sheep don't know what they mean. That way they can apply whatever traits they need to apply to them to illicit an emotional response they need, then apply that term to the entity or event they want to target. Then the sheep regurgitate those arguments to others convincing fellow sheep and gaslighting others with their stupidity. One of the reasons arguing with these people is so pointless. You may as well be arguing with a voice recorder they have no idea what they are saying and an appeal to logic is useless as they are incapable of such a thing. I've actually broke people a few times where the just begin looping and eventually they just break and devolve into racism or some similar bigoted viewpoint these pundits latch onto for their appeal to emotion.
This is very interesting and not discussed enough, thanks for sharing. Could you refer to some materials, where did you learn it?
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