The New Way of the World

This powerful account of neoliberalism as a form of government by major French theorists Pierre Dardot and Christian Laval explores the genesis of neoliberalism-and the political and economic circumstances of its deployment- and dispels numerous common misconceptions about it. Dardot and Laval argue that neoliberalism is neither a return to classical liberalism nor the restoration of pure capitalism and show that to misinterpret neoliberalism is to fail to understand what is new about it: far from viewing the market as a natural given that limits state action, neoliberalism seeks to construct the market and use it as a model for governments. Only once this concept is grasped will the opponents of neoliberalism be able to meet the unprecedented political and intellectual challenge it poses. Historian and philosopher Philip Mirowski calls The New Way of the World: On Neoliberal Society the best modern realization of Foucault's pioneering approach to the history of neoliberalism. The Los Angeles Review of Books calls the book erudite and provocative.