LIST OF PANELS

General Objectives, Research Questions and Scientific Relevance

After the 2008 financial crisis, backlash against globalization and liberal values emerged as neoliberalism deepened inequalities. Instead of challenging market logic “tout court”, this backlash fueled illiberal and neo-nationalist neoliberalism, fusing libertarian economics with religious and moral conservatism, for example. In policymaking, this combination drives moral and cultural reaction and pro-market restructuring across countries such as the Americas, Hungary, Poland, and India, rolling back environmental regulation, attacking civil and women’s rights, and weakening labor protections. It also selectively reshapes globalization via tariffs, sanctions, and geopolitical pressure to strengthen corporate power and reorganize economic integration.

This section’s main themes are geoeconomics, reactionary neoliberalism, dismantling public policy, implications for social policy, and global integration enmeshed in the political role of religion. Against this backdrop, we welcome papers examining:

1. Geoeconomics as a strategy for restructuring globalization and reinforcing corporate power;
2. The dismantling of public policies through illiberal backlash, neo-nationalist conservatism, and ultra-libertarian ideology;
3. Implications for social policy, development, and new forms of global economic integration; and
4. The political role of religious actors advancing illiberal neoliberal agendas.

Call for papers

We especially invite interdisciplinary and methodologically plural contributions, including qualitative case studies, empirical studies, comparative analyses, and theoretical interventions. Papers may engage this agenda through interpretive policy analysis, discourse analysis, political economy, historical inquiry, ethnography, or related approaches. The section also welcomes critical examinations of the concepts of illiberal neoliberalism and religious mobilization across different cultural settings (Catholic, evangelical, Hindu, etc.), including contributions that test their analytical reach, identify their limits, or propose alternative interpretations. Questions can be raised addressing the combination of agendas and the relationship between religious and other groups pursuing social conservative agendas and groups pursuing economic neoliberal agendas. A good example in Latin America is provided by the funding activities of the John Templeton Foundation with extraordinary funding in both the area of religion (and science) and “free market”. Another example relates to the relationship between Opus Dei and organizations of the Atlas think tank network including the Acton Institute and catholic neoliberal intellectuals like Alejandro Chafuen, the former head of the Atlas Network. Of interest are struggles over the interpretation of papal encyclicals and the conflicts within the major and minor churches regarding economic and social policy agendas and democracy at large.

Requirements for Applicants

The workshop welcomes researchers, graduate students, public managers, practitioners, and activists interested in interpretive policy analysis, public service interactions, emotions in policy processes, social inequalities, inclusive institutions, and critical approaches to public administration.

Following the selection process, participants will be expected to submit a more developed paper (1.500-2.000 words) that engages more deeply with one of the issues or themes introduced in the abstract proposal.

Language

The workshop will be conducted in English and Portuguese

References

Plehwe, Dieter Quinn Slobodian, Philip Mirowski (Hrsg.): Nine Lives of Neoliberalism. Verso 2020 (Introduction),

Laruffa, F., & Plehwe, D. (2026). After Neoliberalism? Interregnum, Polycrisis and the Principle of Expansive Democratisation. Global Society, 1–27. https://doi.org/10.1080/13600826.2026.2647237

Slobodian, Quinn: Hayek’s Bastards: Race, Gold, IQ, and the Capitalism of the Far Right, Princeton: Zone Books 2025