Market populism
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'''Market populism''' is a term coined by [[Thomas Frank]] for the concept that the [[free market]] is more [[democratic]] than any [[democracy]]. Frank himself does not believe this premise and sets forth arguments against it in his book ''[[One Market Under God]]''.
The concept's origins stretch back at least as far as 1933, when political scientist [[Harold Lasswell]] wrote that:
:The propagandaist outlook in fact combines respect for individuality with indifference to formal democracy. The respect for individuality arises from the dependence of large scale operations upon the support of the mass and upon experience with the variability of human preferences. The newspaper, the cigarette, the tooth paste, all depend upon a daily mass referendum. The possibility always looms that a new combination of appeals will supersede the old and push old tracts of fixed and specialized capital out of use. [http://zpedia.org/Propaganda_%28Encyclopaedia_of_the_Social_Sciences%29]
The concept received major widespread prominence in the 1990s when it was used to justify the [[New Economy]] and support for the free market.
An alternative to Frank's [[leftist]] view was presented by economist [[Friedrich Hayek]] in his classic book ''The Road to Serfdom'' in which he presented the alternative view, a pro-market populism view. Hayek argued that political and civil liberty cannot exist without the [[free market]] in turn.
"The market is a democracy in which every penny gives a right to vote." -- [[Ludwig von Mises]], ''Planned Chaos''<ref>[http://www.mises.org/web/2714 Planned Chaos<!-- Bot generated title -->]</ref>
== References ==
{{reflist}}
== See also ==
* [[Austrian School|Austrian School of economic thought]]
== External links ==
* [http://www.thenation.com/doc/20001030/frank Article by Frank from] ''[[The Nation]]'' October 12, 2000
* [http://www.mises.org/freemarket_detail.asp?control=572 The Democracy of the Market] by William H. Peterson, [[Ludwig von Mises Institute]], November 2005
* [http://www.mises.org/freemarket_detail.asp?control=467 The Meaning of Market Democracy] by William H. Peterson, [[Ludwig von Mises Institute]], December 2003
[[Category:Libertarianism]]
[[Category:Political ideologies]]
[[Category:Economic ideologies]]