ABSTRACT
Neoliberalism, defined as the art of exclusion through inclusion, has its roots in modern economics. At the turn of the 18th and 19th centuries, economic theories were invented to justify the exclusive distribution of finite resources. The catastrophic experiences of two World Wars resulted from the exclusive distributional order led commentators such as Karl Polanyi to believe that systemic grasping of resources in the guise of economic theory no longer had a place in society. This chapter demonstrates that Polanyi’s optimism was misguided. The alliance between Friedrich Hayek and his sympathetic business funders formed immediately after the Second World War plays a decisive role in nurturing the power asymmetry between the very rich and the rest of society that is today plaguing climate mitigation. Highlighting the role that money played in the “free” competition between Hayek’s ideas (which are exclusionary in nature) and John Maynard Keynes’ (which are inclusive in nature), the chapter argues that it is as dangerous—if not more—to treat neoliberalism as a strand of honest economic theories or a genuine ideology as it is to treat climate denialism as true science.
