Dean Baker's war of position

Abstract

The US economist Dean Baker, along with his colleagues at the Center for Economic and Policy Research, has for the last decade been waging a Gramscian ‘war of position’ against neoliberal orthodoxy in the US. With the collapse of the housing market bubble (which Baker predicted) and the ensuing global economic crisis, his analysis has had more of a hearing in the mainstream. According to Baker, the internationalisation and deregulation of financial markets has been a mechanism for redistributing upwards the benefits of labour productivity growth and led to a hugely overblown financial sector prone to self deception, criminality and highly speculative short-term profiteering. An alternative can be found, argues Baker, in Latin America’s rejection of neoliberalism.