ABSTRACT
Domestically, neoliberalism diminishes the role of the government in the economy, greatly reducing the regulation of markets, increasing the privatization or contracting out of previously state-run activities, and downplaying the management of aggregate demand management, while cutting taxes for the well-to-do and spending on social welfare programs. American economics has contributed to this metamorphosis while simultaneously analyzing its impacts, both good and bad. Economics imperialism has been judged an outstanding success by both supporters and opponents, and the resulting self-confidence that has characterized mainstream economists has often been noted. The one institutional exception to this general rule is Duke University, home to the Center for the History of Economic Thought and to an important and steadily growing archival collection, and the host of regular international conferences in the sub-discipline. Philip Mirowski invokes the theory of cognitive dissonance to explain how neoliberalism survived the Great Recession not just unscathed but actually strengthened.
