Market Government Neoliberalism and the transformative power of 1989

The fall of the Wall in 1989 has had an unmistakable effect on the political and ideological landscape in Europe and elsewhere. One only needs to refer to Francis Fukuyama’s The End of History and the Last Man to see how it sparked a sense of implosion of long-worn ideological oppositions, while at the same time spurring a clear triumphalism within Western liberal thought. ¹ While 1989 never delivered the promised end of history, it continues to constitute a formative moment in the history of modern political thought. This chapter seeks to examine the effect of 1989 in one particular corner of liberal political thought and practice: its effect on the history of neoliberalism, specifically in Western Europe.