Neoliberalism: A Useful Category of History Analysis?

Is neoliberalism merely an economic ideology or a means of ordering society? Is it just the high-minded aims of policy wonks or a Gramscian cultural hegemonic process? Is neoliberalism just a desire for greater economic efficiency or part of a 300 year process between community and the market?

Ben Jackson is Professor of Modern History at University College, Oxford, who focuses on modern British history but also US and European history. He mainly focuses on political thought, from liberalism, socialism and Scottish Nationalism, and the rise (as well as somewhat demise!) of the welfare state. He has written and co-edited books on the premiership of Margaret Thatcher as well as The Neo-Liberal Age? Britain Since the 1970s just recently.