Take it from the top (down)? Rethinking neoliberalism and political hierarchy in Mexico

Abstract

ABSTRACT In this article, I unpack the relationship between neoliberalism as a policy framework and as a rationality of governance by examining the daily practices of Mexican technocrats with advanced academic degrees in neoclassical economics. Neoclassical economics is implicitly regarded as the transparent technical mechanism through which neoliberal ideas are transmitted to policy. In contrast, I approach neoclassical economics as a system of knowledge for analyzing how markets work that is constituted and negotiated as it is applied to policy. Whereas existing accounts suggest that neoclassical economics effectively sanitizes politics by rendering the political technical, I argue that technical struggles are embedded in and prefigured by political struggles. I take the negotiations between political teams as a starting point from which to interrogate deep‐seated assumptions about the rigidity of neoclassical economics, and I emphasize the role of what I call “anticipatory knowledge,” knowledge marshaled by political teams in anticipation of the knowledge claims of rival teams. [neoliberalism, economics, governmentality, expert knowledge, Mexico, policy]

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