Jim Devine wrote: > > in my never-ending battle against the use of clichés, I'm looking for > a new synonym for "neoliberal" and "neoliberalism." I think > "marketron" is a good replacement for "neoliberalism," but > "marketronism" is too clumsy. Any ideas? > > in Solidarity with the Global War on Cliché,
I usually think of clichés as semi-dead metaphors, or at least phrases (rather than single words) that if looked at 'feel' like a metaphor. Neoliberalism was/is not a metaphor, and if it is objectionable I suspect that the diagnosis is not that it's a cliche (any more than water is a cliche for h20) but a misnomer to begin with, a misnomer, however, grounded in the ambiguity of the stem term, "liberal." "Liberal" has always been used in fairly contradictory senses, so NEOliberal was bound to be vague. I guess I'm suggesting that the problem is not the presence of a cliché but the _absence_ of one, i.e., of a technical term (jargon) of sufficient precision. But isn't that the problem with _all_ the major terms of political, social, or economic debate and/or analysis? We just have continually to explain _some_ of our labels each time we write to a different audience or to the same audience on a topic not recently introduced. But if you still want a new term for neoliberalism I would suggest imperialism. ;-> > > Jim Devine
