Power and the Ascendance of New Economic Policy Ideas: Lessons from the 1980s Crisis in Israel

Abstract

Recent explanations of transformations of macroeconomic policy under crisis conditions spotlight the intrinsic properties of ideas and the persuasiveness with which they are marketed. Bridging the divide between power and discourse approaches, this article reveals the causal role played by the power resources of expert ideational entrepreneurs, conditional on the political conjuncture in which they operate. The authors exploit a fortuitous natural experiment from the early 1980s, when the Israeli economy spiraled into hyperinflation. Two similar proposals for economic stabilization and reform were offered by different teams of economists, less than two years apart. While the government rejected the dollarization plan, its authorization of the stabilization plan inaugurated a new political-economic regime. This case, in which similar programs were advocated by different ideational entrepreneurs in a largely stable institutional and economic context, makes it possible to pinpoint why radically new ideas succeed or fail. Previously underutilized analytical tools are employed to conceptualize the power of idea carriers, at both the individual and the group level.

Theorizing ideational continuity: The resilience of neo-liberal ideas in Europe

“…83 See Orenstein in this volume. 84 See, for example, Fourcade 2009;Mandelkern and Shalev 2010;and Ban 2012. 85 See Mackenzie 2006 andMackenzie et al 2007. can actually be helpful to neo-liberal ideational entrepreneurs, allowing ideologues to continue to promote it as a set of principles and values even (or perhaps especially) if its detailed policy programme has been subject to compromise by the pragmatists or abandoned by opportunists because of problems with the policies.…”

A virada ideacional: quando e como ideias importam

“…Vários autores adotam e/ou iniciam suas análises a partir desse procedimento (Mandelkern & Shalev 2010;Dobbin 2004;Bleich 2003;Skogstad 1998;Béland & Cox 2016;Hansen & King 2001). P. Hall (1989), por exemplo, procura definir o keynesianismo como política de gerenciamento anticíclico da demanda agregada, o que implicaria aceitar a intervenção governamental na economia e ter uma visão oposta ao monetarismo sobre o papel da política fiscal.…”

“…Para evidenciar o peso causal de ideias, recorre-se em geral à comparação entre casos positivos e negativos -o método da diferença, de Stuart Mill (1886) -ou o most similar systems design descrito por Przeworsky & Teune (1982), em que casos similares em vários aspectos diferenciam-se quanto ao fenômeno a ser explicado e quanto a presença (ou ausência) de uma suposta variável explicativa. São inúmeros os autores que utilizam a comparação para ilustrar a correlação entre ideias e políticas pú-blicas: alguns comparam políticas diferentes em um mesmo país (Walsh 2000;Goldstein 1988;Kingdon 2014;Larsen & Andersen 2009;Ferejohn 1993); outros comparam políticas similares em um mesmo país (Mandelkern & Shalev 2010;Ferejohn 1993) e ao longo do tempo (Alston et al, 2016); existem aqueles que comparam políticas similares em países distintos (Heclo 1974;Skogstad 1998;Cox 2001;Blyth 2002). Berman (1998), por exemplo, buscou explicar por que a social-democracia sueca, diferentemente da alemã, foi capaz de produzir uma política de alianças antifascista.…”

“…Skogstad (1998) discute a excepcionalidade da agricultura e o paradigma da assistência tendo em vista os casos americanos e europeu. Mandelkern & Shalev (2010) examinam por que dois planos econômicos aparentemente similares obtiveram níveis de aceitação e sucesso diferentes em Israel. Dobbin (2004) investiga as diferentes participações do Estado no desenvolvimento industrial, considerando o desenvolvimento da política ferroviária na França e Estados Unidos.…”

What made Economists so Politically Influential? Governance-related Ideas and Institutional Entrepreneurship in the Economic Liberalisation of Israel and beyond

“…The 1985 Emergency Economic Stabilization Plan is a paradigmatic case of economic liberalisation driven by economists , Shalev 1999, Maman and Rosenhek 2007, Mandelkern and Shalev 2010. As in the French and Mexican cases discussed by FourcadeGourinchas and Babb (2002), no substantial societal force was dedicated to economic liberalisation.…”