Note: I wouldn't normally waste your time with this stuff. But I never seem to write on this site anymore and I had just finished writing this essay when I decided I might as well post it on issues.oz. I'm still writing that big essay about the sente. I'll post it soon.

Neo-liberalism is one of the more interesting and all pervasive political movements of recent decades. But what drives neo-liberalism? Where does it come from and where is it taking us?

The paramount place held by free markets in the policies of many governments around the world, is generally attributed to the influence of neo-liberal thought among policy makers. Neo-liberals, like classical liberals, believe that the freedom of individuals is the most important pillar of a well managed society. However for neo-liberals, freedom is not valued for its own sake. It is a means to an ends. For neo-liberals freedom is not so much the natural and ideal state of human existence as it is the best means by which to improve standards of living and wealth within society.

Ironically, neo-liberals tend not to see that same freedom as being defended by democracy. Rather they see democracy as frequently leading to a tyranny of the masses. For the neo-liberal, true natural democracy comes from the freedom held by individuals to spend their money where they please and to offer their utility as workers, to whom they please. They believe in the democracy of dollars.

Neo-liberals see free unfettered markets as being the natural state of relations between human beings. For neo-liberals free markets are natural in the same way that birth, gravity and death are. Sometimes we might curse the natural state of things, but in the long run we know that they are both inevitable and necessary.

This attitude, along with a pre-existing cynicism for democracy, leads neo-liberals in their efforts to A: reduce government interference in markets and B: de-politicize the operation of markets. They believe that the operations of free-markets in the economy should not be used as a political soccer ball, but that if it is, it should be kicked in the direction of deregulation and decreased government involvement. They believe that such matters should be beyond the scope of politics and democracy. In the same way that governments can?’t legislate against death or gravity, nor should they be allowed to legislate against free unfettered markets. For neo-liberals it is considered both futile and unproductive for governments to even try.

The political agenda of neo-liberals is double pronged. Their first priority is to convince the rest of the world, that they should adopt a laissez faire attitude to the way markets operate. Their second goal to lock these neo-liberal reforms into place: to enshrine neo-liberalism into the very constitution of nation states. To make it harder for democratic governments to meddle in the affairs of markets and economies is the end game for neo-liberals. They do this through special international treaties on free trade, the advancement of appointed (undemocratic) world bodies of trade governance and through the discouragement of internal democracy within nations.

In fairness to neo-liberals, the goal of "locking in" ones political reforms at the expense of democracy is not something that is unique to neo-liberalism. Socialists, conservatives and other liberals, all strive to achieve reforms within democratic governments and then put those reforms beyond the reach of future democratically elected governments. Nor, in fairness to neo-liberals, is it unique among political theories to have a healthy disdain for democracy and the immense power wielded by elected officials in its name.

The difference is that neo-liberals seem to do very well at it: they manage to neuter democratic processes with much greater efficiency then conservatives or socialists ever have. So we notice the efforts of neo-liberals so much more. Over the last 20 years neo-liberals have not only had much of their policy agenda adopted by western governments, they have also made great strides in their efforts to lock these reforms into place, alienating voters in democracies around the world as citizens feel increasingly powerless to change the course of their communities.

The key difference here is globalization: a political project of neo-liberals. The nature of globalization lends itself well to this locking in of neo-liberal reform. Globalization has a disdain for democracy that neatly suits the needs of neo-liberals wishing to put their neo-liberal reforms beyond the reach of democratic governments.

Globalization breaks down borders between countries. It drags national identity into irrelevance. When goods can be traded between buyers and sellers in one country with the same ease that it can with buyers and sellers in different countries the very concept of being a citizen within a nation-state starts to fade into insignificance. This then is why globalization undermines democracies: international capital, market trends and markets themselves flow between and straddle borders between nations while democratically legitimized government influence reaches only as far as the border between it and the next nation. In an increasingly globalized world the dollar has infinite reach. The 20th century notion of a Democratic Government reaches only as far as the next thick black line on a political map. How can democratic governments compete with international capital when international capital has influence anywhere in the world?

Of course many people argue that this is not a terminal problem with globalization. They argue that the globalisation movement can be reformed: made to be more accommodating to democratic governments and a more fertile base for international democracy. They argue that in an ever shrinking world there is even greater potential for global democracy to accompany our global economy. But how will this be done? Does not democracy require its constituent citizens to have at least some basic commonality among them? We have democracy on the level of nation states because we still hold onto the assumption that there is such a thing as an Australian condition: something that legitimizes the fact that we all vote together for a government that will lead us regardless of how we feel about where it?’s taking us. How is such understanding possible on a global level? Despite what neo-liberals might tell us about the break down of cultural and economic barriers under the guide of globalization, democracy on an international level is still no sure thing and certainly not merely a matter of time. For all the breaking down of cultural barriers between nations, it doesn?’t take an anthropologist to see that the difference between a sweatshop worker in Indonesia and a business executive in New York is about as great as difference between 2 human beings can be and that this difference will make it hard for them to vote together in an international democracy.

To the amazement of those that see the enormous pressure that this planet is under, neo-liberalism chooses this turning point in history to rise up and become such a dominant paradigm. Why does a political agenda that promotes the growth of industry, consumption, pollution and environmental degradation, choose now to become the dominant way of thinking about the economic relationships between people?

Well nothing develops in a vacuum. Everything comes of a context and following a precedent.

The political context for neo-liberalism was a world that, quite of its own and without political pressure of any sort, was getting smaller as communication, transport and manufacturing technology improved throughout the 20th century. In short, neo-liberalism grew up in an increasingly globalised world. So neo-liberals are not consciously rallying against environmentalism. Rather they are just going with the flow of a less visible tendency that is flowing in reverse to environmentalism: technological growth. It?’s not neo-liberals that started the globalization ball rolling. It?’s been rolling down the hill of history since long before Margaret Thatcher and Ronald Reagan became influential policy makers. It's been rolling ever since the telephone was invented. Neo-liberals just like to kick it along a bit. It was technology got it started and it is technological advancement that remains the driving force behind globalisation.

The political precedent for both neo-liberalism and globalisation was communism. Communism was the swing of the pendulum that preceded the one we are on now. Neo-liberals look back at the 20th century and take from it one great lesson. That socialism doesn?’t work and that communism, as Marx dreamt of it, doesn?’t exist. Furthermore, the underlying logic of neo-liberalism is not a new. The idea that individual human beings should be allowed to do as they please, untouched by the power of government is older then industrialism, capitalism, communism or environmentalism. So clearly neo-liberalism is not isolated from the political movements that came before it. It is entirely related to, caused by and a part of, the movements that came before it.

Nor did neo-liberals wake up one morning and decide in unison that democracy was a political movement worth undermining. Globalization both needs and causes the breakdown of democratic power. If in pushing along the globalization project neo-liberals kick over a few democracies too that is considered to be mere collateral damage.

This erosion of democracy works in many different ways. The American system of Democracy (the very constitution itself) has neo-liberalism written all over it. Campaign finance in American has long been a hot button question on both sides of politics. Say what you want about free speech and the right held by wealthy people to exercise it in paid TV advertisement but the fact of the matter is that in America, you can?’t run for government of any sort unless you have a lot of money supporting you. Well neo-liberals have the money supporting them. This is why neo-liberals do great in American politics. They have half the fight sewn up with the support they get from big business. Even the welfare-liberals in Washington, Democrats mostly, have to cozy up to neo-liberal in the big end of town if they want to have some chance at beating the hardcore neo-liberals (typically Republicans). All this makes it so much easier for neo-liberals in the world?’s wealthiest nation to lock in their neo-liberal reforms: the rules of their democracy make it that much easier.

Neo-liberalism is one of the most pervasive political ideologies of our time and it is definitely transforming the world. Whether it?’s changing the world for the better of for the worse depends on who you talk to. Some say that the technological development of the human race is the only thing that may one day save us. Others say that the planet simply can?’t take anymore development. However regardless of which point of view you subscribe to, one point seems necessary to acknowledge. Neo-liberalism is not an evil force bent on corrupting human kind and the planet it lives on. It?’s just yet another political movement riding the wave of a pre-existing natural movement and it is merely the most recent in a long line of political paradigms marching through history