The Great Persuasion: Reinventing Free Markets since the Depression

The social and economic landscape of the United States shifted significantly after the financial crash of 2008. The ensuing downturn led both businesses and consumers to face severe restrictions on their access to credit. The subprime mortgage crisis changed the nature of home ownership for many Americans. Growth rates and unemployment figures became the subjects of intense political debate. Alongside these macroeconomic developments, populist movements on both right and left – the Tea Party and Occupy Wall Street, respectively – responded vigorously, and, in some cases, intemperately, to the nation’s chastened fiscal circumstances. These developments left intellectuals and political pundits wondering whether the socalled ‘culture wars’ – which were said to have structured public debate around issues such as abortion, gun control, gay rights and creationism – had been complicated by the re-emergence of a more basic fault line centred on the efficacy and morality of an economic system dedicated to the idea of the ‘free market’.