Dialogue, Monologue, or Something in Between? Neoliberal Think Tanks in the Americas

Abstract

This article utilizes a neo-Gramscian framework to interrogate the processes of transnational class and state formation in the western hemisphere as outlined by William Robinson. It examines the role of elite-backed policy institutes in the 40-year transition to a transnationally integrated, hemispheric, political economy underpinned by neoliberal regimes of flexible accumulation. It positions these groups as “organic intellectuals,” both rationalizing the neoliberal bloc’s development and legitimizing its worldview as “common sense” in the press. However, the “transnationalization” of this policy network has been uneven, with northern funding directing intellectual projects in the south. To explore this dynamic, this article uses as a case study the Inter-American Dialogue, a transnational think tank that promotes hemispheric neoliberal consolidation.