Subtopic Deep Dive
Neoliberalism in Political Economy
Research Guide
What is Neoliberalism in Political Economy?
Neoliberalism in political economy analyzes market deregulation, privatization, and fiscal austerity as core policies promoting global market integration while reshaping state roles and exacerbating inequality.
This subtopic critiques neoliberal paradigms through lenses of coloniality, moral economy, and multistakeholder governance. Key works include Tlostanova (2015) with 123 citations on post-Soviet knowledge coloniality and Jessop & Sum (2019) with 16 citations reevaluating Polanyi's critique of market embeddedness. Over 20 papers from the corpus explore neoliberalism's intersections with globalization ideologies.
Why It Matters
Neoliberal policies influence global inequality by prioritizing deregulation over social welfare, as analyzed in Napolitano (2012) linking development to power distributions. Tlostanova (2015) reveals how coloniality sustains neoliberal knowledge dominance in post-Soviet contexts, affecting policy debates. Jessop & Sum (2019) apply cultural political economy to challenge neoliberal market logics, informing critiques of privatization in regional integration (Medeiros, 2003).
Key Research Challenges
Coloniality in Knowledge Production
Post-Soviet social sciences face coloniality challenges in global knowledge hierarchies, limiting non-Western neoliberal critiques (Tlostanova, 2015). This manifests in area studies versus disciplinary divides. Reflexive approaches struggle against West-centrism (Eun, 2021).
Legitimacy in Multistakeholder Governance
Neoliberal global governance like ICANN relies on institutional sources for legitimacy amid privatization (Jongen & Scholte, 2023). Multistakeholderism promises advantages but faces belief gaps. Relational area studies seek to counter Eurocentric logics (Cheskin & Jašina-Schäfer, 2022).
Critiquing Market Embeddedness
Polanyi's moral economy framework critiques neoliberal deregulation but requires cultural political economy integration (Jessop & Sum, 2019). Post-apocalyptic narratives highlight structural appropriation in neoliberal precarity (Hsu & Yazell, 2019). Uneven power distributions persist in sustainability politics (Napolitano, 2012).
Essential Papers
Can the post-Soviet think? On coloniality of knowledge, external imperial and double colonial difference
Madina Tlostanova · 2015 · Intersections · 123 citations
The article considers the main challenges faced by the post-Soviet social sciences in the global configuration of knowledge, marked by omnipresentcoloniality. In disciplinary terms this syndrome is...
The Social Sciences in the Asian Century
Vera Mackie, Carol Johnson, Tessa Morris-Suzuki · 2015 · ANU Press eBooks · 45 citations
A key focus of this book is the importance of intellectual engagement with Asia. Particular emphasis is placed on the new theoretical and practical insights that can be gained by doing so that are ...
Imagined worlds
Sheila Jasanoff · 2020 · 44 citations
This chapter analyses how the predictive politics of future-making fundamentally alters existing practices of constitutional democratic government by upsetting three of its foundational attributes:...
Polanyi: Classical Moral Economist or Pioneer Cultural Political Economist?
Bob Jessop, Ngai‐Ling Sum · 2019 · Österreichische Zeitschrift für Soziologie · 16 citations
This article evaluates Polanyi's work from two complementary theoretical perspectives: moral economy and cultural political economy. Polanyi's comparative historical analyses of substantive economi...
Institutional sources of legitimacy in multistakeholder global governance at <scp>ICANN</scp>
Hortense Jongen, Jan Aart Scholte · 2023 · Regulation & Governance · 11 citations
Abstract This article provides a novel systematic exploration of ways and extents that institutional characteristics shape legitimacy beliefs toward multistakeholder global governance. Multistakeho...
Post-apocalyptic geographies and structural appropriation
Hsuan L. Hsu, Bryan Yazell · 2019 · 8 citations
This chapter stages a critique of “post-apocalypticism” through a sustained analysis of environmental precarity and its temporal, post-human implications. We argue that the centering of US American...
Reflexive Solidarity: Toward a Broadening of What It Means to be “Scientific” in Global IR Knowledge
Yong-Soo Eun · 2021 · All Azimuth A Journal of Foreign Policy and Peace · 8 citations
This article shows that the problem of “West-centrism” in the study of International Relations (IR) is synonymous with the problem of the dominance of positivism, a particular version of science th...
Reading Guide
Foundational Papers
Start with Napolitano (2012) for development-power links in neoliberal sustainability, then Medeiros (2003) on state integration limits, establishing core critiques of deregulation.
Recent Advances
Study Tlostanova (2015) for coloniality, Jessop & Sum (2019) for Polanyi updates, and Jongen & Scholte (2023) for governance legitimacy advances.
Core Methods
Core techniques: cultural political economy (Jessop & Sum, 2019), reflexive solidarity against positivism (Eun, 2021), relational area studies (Cheskin & Jašina-Schäfer, 2022).
How PapersFlow Helps You Research Neoliberalism in Political Economy
Discover & Search
Research Agent uses searchPapers and exaSearch to find neoliberalism critiques like Tlostanova (2015), then citationGraph reveals 123 citing works on coloniality, and findSimilarPapers uncovers Jessop & Sum (2019) for Polanyi-neoliberal links.
Analyze & Verify
Analysis Agent applies readPaperContent to extract deregulation impacts from Jongen & Scholte (2023), verifies claims with CoVe chain-of-verification, and uses runPythonAnalysis for citation network stats via pandas on OpenAlex data, graded by GRADE for evidence strength in inequality analyses.
Synthesize & Write
Synthesis Agent detects gaps in post-Soviet neoliberal studies, flags contradictions between Tlostanova (2015) and Mackie et al. (2015), while Writing Agent uses latexEditText, latexSyncCitations for Polanyi sections, and latexCompile to produce inequality critique manuscripts with exportMermaid for governance flowcharts.
Use Cases
"Analyze inequality trends in neoliberal post-Soviet economies using stats."
Research Agent → searchPapers → Analysis Agent → runPythonAnalysis (pandas on citation/inequality data from Tlostanova 2015) → matplotlib inequality plots and statistical summary exported as CSV.
"Draft LaTeX critique of neoliberalism in ICANN governance."
Research Agent → citationGraph (Jongen & Scholte 2023) → Synthesis Agent → gap detection → Writing Agent → latexEditText + latexSyncCitations + latexCompile → peer-reviewed LaTeX manuscript with diagrams.
"Find code for modeling neoliberal market deregulation simulations."
Research Agent → paperExtractUrls → Code Discovery → paperFindGithubRepo → githubRepoInspect → runnable Python scripts for Polanyi-inspired economy models linked to Jessop & Sum (2019).
Automated Workflows
Deep Research workflow conducts systematic review of 50+ neoliberalism papers, chaining searchPapers → citationGraph → structured inequality report with GRADE grading. DeepScan applies 7-step analysis to Tlostanova (2015), verifying coloniality claims via CoVe checkpoints. Theorizer generates alternative paradigms from Polanyi critiques in Jessop & Sum (2019), synthesizing moral economy extensions.
Frequently Asked Questions
What defines neoliberalism in political economy?
Neoliberalism promotes market deregulation, privatization, and austerity to integrate economies globally, reshaping state roles and increasing inequality (Tlostanova, 2015; Jessop & Sum, 2019).
What are key methods in this subtopic?
Methods include cultural political economy (Jessop & Sum, 2019), coloniality of knowledge analysis (Tlostanova, 2015), and institutional legitimacy studies in multistakeholderism (Jongen & Scholte, 2023).
What are pivotal papers?
Tlostanova (2015, 123 citations) on post-Soviet coloniality; Jessop & Sum (2019, 16 citations) on Polanyi's neoliberal critique; Napolitano (2012, 8 citations) on development power dynamics.
What open problems exist?
Challenges include overcoming West-centrism in IR (Eun, 2021), relational area studies for non-Eurocentric views (Cheskin & Jašina-Schäfer, 2022), and legitimacy in neoliberal governance (Jongen & Scholte, 2023).
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