The relative isolation of conservative intellectuals in the wake of the Great Depression had created an extraordinarily fl uid ideological environment, in which market advocates were eager to recognize the limits to laissezfaire and social traditionalists were quick to acknowledge the benefi ts of the market mechanism. Hayek was not trying to adjudicate between static ideologies, but rather to develop one anew.

Angus Burgin, The Great Persuasion, loc. 264