Neoliberalism and “Blaming the Victim” Ideology

Like communism, neoliberalism too promotes its own utopia, an idealized classless society where every human being has equivalent capacity to become enterpreneur , and where there is a level playing field on which individuals compete in line with the logic of market rationality. Consequently, neoliberalism conceals a moral standard which is inherently tainted by victim-blaming ideology; its social compassion (if any) for the poverty-related human suffering is never free from smug questions such as: Why don’t they try hard enough to participate in the market? Why wouldn’t they learn the logic of the free market ? Why should we be expected to pay for their failures and suffering? Excerpts from Treanor (http://web.inter.nl.net/Paul.Treanor/neoliberalism) . . . as you would expect from a complete philosophy, neoliberalism has answers to stereotypical philosophical questions such as “Why are we here” and “What should I do”: We are here for the market, and you should compete. Neo-liberals tend to believe that human exist for the market — not the other way around: certainly in the sense that it is good to participate in the market, and that those who do not participate have failed in some ways.

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~ by dedynhidayat on March 10, 2008.