THIS IS THE eND:
In Defence of Neoliberalism: The neoliberal turn was a pragmatic response to failed economic intervention and yielded broadly positive results (Austin O’Connell, 25 Apr 2025, Quillette)
According to the Fraser Institute’s Economic Freedom Index, the world’s economic freedom score has increased from 5.25 out of 10 in 1980 to 6.53 today. This is the result of shifts that have taken place in a number of countries, including the following examples:
Chile: In 1973, socialist president Salvador Allende was deposed by General Augusto Pinochet in a military coup. While brutally socially repressive, Pinochet’s dictatorship was economically liberal, implementing sweeping market reforms. Guided by the Chicago Boys—free-market economists trained at the University of Chicago—Pinochet privatised many state-owned enterprises, liberalised international trade, and tightened government spending and the growth of the money supply.
Britain: Margaret Thatcher’s Conservative government privatised state-owned industries, reduced the power of trade unions, cut taxes, and likewise tightened the growth of the money supply.
China: Under Deng Xiaoping, China began privatising state-owned land and established free trade in special economic zones.United States: Ronald Reagan, an admirer and ally of Thatcher’s, ended oil price controls, deregulated certain sectors of the economy, and cut taxes. Meanwhile, Federal Reserve Chairman Paul Volcker implemented monetary tightening to curb inflation.
New Zealand: In the 1980s, a Labour government launched market reforms dubbed “Rogernomics” after Finance Minister Roger Douglas. These included dismantling state monopolies, deregulating financial markets, removing price controls, and privatising state-owned enterprises.
The Soviet Bloc: The fall of the Berlin Wall in 1989 marked the beginning of the Soviet Union’s collapse and the onset of market-oriented economic reforms in its Eastern European satellite states.India: Facing a severe balance of payments crisis in 1991, Prime Minister P.V. Narasimha Rao and Finance Minister Manmohan Singh implemented sweeping reforms, including trade liberalisation, deregulation, and privatisation.
As these cases demonstrate, both right and left-wing governments in democratic and authoritarian regimes across the world embraced varying degrees of market reform within a relatively short period.