Neoliberalism in the Laboratory? Experimental Economics on Markets and their Limits

Abstract

Experimental economics is now part of mainstream economics and is fast becoming one of its most influential methods. Drawing on the distinction between market and behavioural experimentation, this article assesses the compatibility of the most influential experimental research with the neoliberal understanding of the political and moral preconditions for markets to develop. A politically relevant asymmetry at the core of this research programme will be signalled: while issues of political economy are eschewed by market experimenters (for example, whose interests are favoured and whose groups have power in economic processes), topics of moral economy are recognised and dealt with by behavioural experimenters (for example, the interactions between economic institutions and individuals' motivations and moral make-up). It is argued that experimental research has thereby contributed to a depoliticised and moralised view of markets, one that tends to present markets as a civilising institution once their technical and moral failures are recognised and adequately dealt with.