Pierre Rosanvallon, from the Critique of Utopian Liberalism to the Critique of the Critique of Neoliberalism

Abstract

The objective of this article is to problematize the place of liberalism in the work of Pierre Rosanvallon through a comparison of two moments of his intellectual career. The first moment is the book 'Le capitalisme utopique', in which the author extends Claude Lefort's critique of totalitarianism to the classical economic liberalism of the 18th century, which he accused of suppressing the political in its representation of society as a market. The second moment is the book 'Notre histoire intellectuelle et politique 1968-2018', in which Rosanvallon criticizes the use of the concept of neoliberalism by the contemporary intellectual left, stating that the critique of this monolithic and elusive concept prevents us from imagining political alternatives. The question I probe is whether this criticism of contemporary uses of the concept of neoliberalism is compatible with the author's critique of classical liberalism. To understand the evolution of the problem of liberalism in Rosanvallon's work, I explore his dialogue with Michel Foucault, arguing that this exchange adds complexity to Rosanvallon's interpretation of liberalism. In closing, I assess Rosanvallon's position on overarching concepts such as totalitarianism and neoliberalism, in light of the distinction between the critique of the founding utopias of modernity and the analysis of democratic experiments in contemporaneity.