Hayek's submissive subjects : response to Son

Jessica Whyte

Research output: Contribution to journalArticlepeer-review

1 Citation (Scopus)

Abstract

Friedrich Hayek repeatedly stressed the centrality of submission to his own account of spontaneous order. In what he depicted as the rationalist refusal to submit to anything beyond human comprehension, he saw a threat to the "spontaneous order" of a market society. Kyong-Min Son's criticism of my account of the neoliberal subject provides me with an opportunity to further specify my understanding of the submissive disposition of the Hayekian subject. In this brief reply, I defend the claim that Hayek saw the complexity and opacity of the market order as constraining the possibility of collective political intervention that aims to alter the outcomes of market competition. While Hayek theorized a subject who was actively invested in the competitive "game," the premise of this investment was submission to the rules of the market and acceptance of its outcomes as a form of fate.
Original languageEnglish
Pages (from-to)194-202
Number of pages9
JournalPolitical Theory
Volume47
Issue number2
DOIs
Publication statusPublished - 2018

Keywords

  • Hayek_Friedrich A. von (Friedrich August)_1899, 1992
  • neoliberalism
  • philosophy

Fingerprint

Dive into the research topics of 'Hayek's submissive subjects : response to Son'. Together they form a unique fingerprint.

Cite this