Rather than simply dismissing this claim, we should look more closely at the neoliberal idea of freedom, and the place of rights and law within it. This means departing from the standard story, according to which the neoliberals in Chile focused on their area of technical economic expertise while turning a blind eye to the repression necessary to implement their economic agenda. On the contrary, not even the most technical of the Chicago economists justified their work in Chile simply on economic grounds. Rather, they argued that the junta had saved Chile from a totalitarian regime, reversing a history of planning and state intervention and making possible individual freedom and human rights.

Jessica Whyte, The Morals of the Market, loc. 308