IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/a/taf/rsocec/v63y2005i4p547-565.html
   My bibliography  Save this article

Knowledge at work: Some neoliberal anachronisms

Author

Listed:
  • Geoffrey Hodgson

Abstract

With a predilection for market solutions, neoliberalism upholds that the individual is generally the best judge of his or her interests. Yet markets are never universally applied as a mechanism of allocation and there are reasons, in principle, why capitalism will always have “missing markets.” Concentrating on the application and appropriateness of neoliberal theory to the workplace, this article argues that firms are not markets, despite some tendencies in modern theory to conflate the two. The employment contract is a key characteristic of modern firms, but neoliberal theory is often silent on the distinction between an employment contract and a contract for services, and largely ignores the asymmetrical rights of authority within contracts of employment. Furthermore, the social nature of knowledge represents a challenge to neoliberal theory and policy, because it sometimes makes it more difficult to define individual property rights. Accordingly, with the growth of the knowledge economy, neoliberalism to some extent is an anachronism.

Suggested Citation

  • Geoffrey Hodgson, 2005. "Knowledge at work: Some neoliberal anachronisms," Review of Social Economy, Taylor & Francis Journals, vol. 63(4), pages 547-565.
    • Handle: RePEc:taf:rsocec:v:63:y:2005:i:4:p:547-565
    DOI: 10.1080/00346760500364403
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: http://www.tandfonline.com/doi/abs/10.1080/00346760500364403
    Download Restriction: Access to full text is restricted to subscribers.
    File URL: https://libkey.io/10.1080/00346760500364403?utm_source=ideas
    LibKey link: if access is restricted and if your library uses this service, LibKey will redirect you to where you can use your library subscription to access this item
    ---><---

    As the access to this document is restricted, you may want to search for a different version of it.

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. James M. Buchanan, 1993. "Property as a Guarantor of Liberty," Chapters, in: Charles K. Rowley (ed.), Property Rights and the Limits of Democracy, chapter 1, pages i-64, Edward Elgar Publishing.
    2. Spencer, Herbert, 1884. "The Man versus the State," History of Economic Thought Books, McMaster University Archive for the History of Economic Thought, number spencer1884.
    3. Spencer J. Pack, 1991. "Capitalism as a Moral System," Books, Edward Elgar Publishing, number 346.
    Full references (including those not matched with items on IDEAS)

    Citations

    Citations are extracted by the CitEc Project, subscribe to its RSS feed for this item.
    as


    Cited by:

    1. Elsner, Wolfram & Hocker, Gero & Schwardt, Henning, 2009. "Simplistic vs. Complex Organization: Markets, Hierarchies, and Networks in an 'Organizational Triangle'," MPRA Paper 14315, University Library of Munich, Germany.
    2. Geoffrey M. Hodgson, 2019. "The great crash of 2008 and the reform of economics," Chapters, in: Jonathan Michie (ed.), The Handbook of Globalisation, Third Edition, chapter 28, pages 439-456, Edward Elgar Publishing.
    3. Rojhat Avsar, 2008. "A Critique of ‘Neoliberal Autonomy’: The Rhetoric of Ownership Society," Forum for Social Economics, Taylor & Francis Journals, vol. 37(2), pages 125-134, January.
    4. Elsner, Wolfram & Schwardt, Henning, 2015. "The (dis-)embedded firm: Complex structure and dynamics in inter-firm relations. Adding institutionalization as a Veblenian dimension to the Coase-Williamson approach – An emerging triangular organiza," MPRA Paper 67193, University Library of Munich, Germany.
    5. Parada, Jairo, 2017. "Innovaciones sociales para territorios “inteligentes”: ¿ficción o realidad? [Social Innovation for “Smart” Territories: Fiction or Reality?]," MPRA Paper 79763, University Library of Munich, Germany, revised 01 Nov 2016.
    6. Jonathan Michie (ed.), 2011. "The Handbook of Globalisation, Second Edition," Books, Edward Elgar Publishing, number 14082.
    7. Rojhat Avsar, 2008. "A Critique of ‘Neoliberal Autonomy’: The Rhetoric of Ownership Society," Forum for Social Economics, Springer;The Association for Social Economics, vol. 37(2), pages 125-134, August.
    8. Javier Leonardo Garay Vargas & Juan Bautista Pavajeau, 2021. "Ideas erradas, acciones equivocadas : cómo el contexto internacional impide la generación de desarrollo," Books, Universidad Externado de Colombia, Facultad de Finanzas, Gobierno y Relaciones Internacionales, number 151, April.

    Most related items

    These are the items that most often cite the same works as this one and are cited by the same works as this one.
    1. Niclas Berggren & Therese Nilsson, 2013. "Does Economic Freedom Foster Tolerance?," Kyklos, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 66(2), pages 177-207, May.
    2. Scott Drylie, 2020. "Professional Scholarship from 1893 to 2020 on Adam Smith’s Views on School Funding: A Heterodox Examination," Econ Journal Watch, Econ Journal Watch, vol. 17(2), pages 350–391-3, September.
    3. Warwick Funnell, 2011. "Social reform, military accounting and the pursuit of economy during the liberal apotheosis, 1906-1912," Accounting History Review, Taylor & Francis Journals, vol. 21(1), pages 69-93.
    4. Niclas Berggren, 2009. "Choosing one’s own informal institutions: on Hayek’s critique of Keynes’s immoralism," Constitutional Political Economy, Springer, vol. 20(2), pages 139-159, June.
    5. Philippe Fontaine, 2000. "Making use of the past: theorists and historians on the economics of altruism," The European Journal of the History of Economic Thought, Taylor & Francis Journals, vol. 7(3), pages 407-422.
    6. Palma, J. G., 2022. "Financialisation as a (it's-not-meant-to-make-sense) gigantic global joke," Cambridge Working Papers in Economics 2211, Faculty of Economics, University of Cambridge.
    7. Ecem Okan, 2017. "How did it all begin? Adam Smith on the early and rude state of society and the age of hunters," Post-Print hal-03171143, HAL.
    8. Simon Glaze, 2015. "Schools Out: Adam Smith and Pre-disciplinary International Political Economy," New Political Economy, Taylor & Francis Journals, vol. 20(5), pages 679-701, October.
    9. Palma, J. G., 2020. "Finance as Perpetual Orgy. How the ‘new alchemists’ twisted Kindleberger’s cycle of “manias, panics and crashes” to “manias, panics and renewed-manias”," Cambridge Working Papers in Economics 2094, Faculty of Economics, University of Cambridge.
    10. Elias L. Khalil, 2002. "Is Adam Smith Liberal?," Journal of Institutional and Theoretical Economics (JITE), Mohr Siebeck, Tübingen, vol. 158(4), pages 664-664, December.
    11. Benoît Walraevens, 2022. "Adam Smith’s Economics and the Lectures on Rhetoric and Belles Lettres: The Language of Commerce," Palgrave Studies in the History of Economic Thought, in: Adam Smith’s System, chapter 6, pages 141-166, Palgrave Macmillan.
    12. Amos Witztum, 2008. "Smith's theory of actions and the moral significance of unintended consequences," The European Journal of the History of Economic Thought, Taylor & Francis Journals, vol. 15(3), pages 401-432.
    13. Radnitzky Gerard, 1996. "The Inconsistency of Liberal Compromises," Journal des Economistes et des Etudes Humaines, De Gruyter, vol. 7(4), pages 1-51, December.
    14. Keith Tribe, 1999. "Adam Smith: Critical Theorist?," Journal of Economic Literature, American Economic Association, vol. 37(2), pages 609-632, June.
    15. Radnitzky Gerard, 1996. "The Inconsistency of Liberal Compromises," Journal des Economistes et des Etudes Humaines, De Gruyter, vol. 7(4), pages 541-588, December.
    16. Ecem Okan, 2017. "How did it all begin? Adam Smith on the early and rude state of society and the age of hunters," The European Journal of the History of Economic Thought, Taylor & Francis Journals, vol. 24(6), pages 1247-1276, November.
    17. J.H. Cooper, 1992. "Distributive Justice, Welfare and Liberalism: Reply," South African Journal of Economics, Economic Society of South Africa, vol. 60(3), pages 188-189, September.
    18. Svetozar Pejovich, 2003. "Understanding the Transaction Costs of Transition: it's the Culture, Stupid," The Review of Austrian Economics, Springer;Society for the Development of Austrian Economics, vol. 16(4), pages 347-361, December.
    19. Steve Pejovich, 2003. "Understanding the transaction costs of transition: it's the culture, stupid," ICER Working Papers 24-2003, ICER - International Centre for Economic Research.
    20. George Djolov, 2014. "Business concentration through the eyes of the HHI," International Journal of Business and Economic Sciences Applied Research (IJBESAR), Democritus University of Thrace (DUTH), Kavala Campus, Greece, vol. 7(2), pages 105-127, September.

    Corrections

    All material on this site has been provided by the respective publishers and authors. You can help correct errors and omissions. When requesting a correction, please mention this item's handle: RePEc:taf:rsocec:v:63:y:2005:i:4:p:547-565. See general information about how to correct material in RePEc.

    If you have authored this item and are not yet registered with RePEc, we encourage you to do it here. This allows to link your profile to this item. It also allows you to accept potential citations to this item that we are uncertain about.

    If CitEc recognized a bibliographic reference but did not link an item in RePEc to it, you can help with this form .

    If you know of missing items citing this one, you can help us creating those links by adding the relevant references in the same way as above, for each refering item. If you are a registered author of this item, you may also want to check the "citations" tab in your RePEc Author Service profile, as there may be some citations waiting for confirmation.

    For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its authors, title, abstract, bibliographic or download information, contact: Chris Longhurst (email available below). General contact details of provider: http://www.tandfonline.com/RRSE20 .

    Please note that corrections may take a couple of weeks to filter through the various RePEc services.

    IDEAS is a RePEc service. RePEc uses bibliographic data supplied by the respective publishers.