The participants in the Semaines Sociales were delighted by the coexistence of capitalism and socialism in France, a position that offered the double advantage of being in conformity with the papal encyclicals and of providing a bulwark against communism. Whereas neoliberalism was officially criticized within Social Catholic circles, this criticism should not obscure the fact that an intellectual proximity existed between the right wing of Social Catholicism and the left wing of neoliberalism. Intransigent liberals still rejected the role Social Catholics granted to the state. André Piettre and Jacques Rueff attempted to find a common ground between neoliberals and Social Catholics, viewing them as "men of goodwill whom . . . vain doctrinal oppositions divided." Some economists belonged to these two parallel universes; among these economists was Gaston Leduc, who became president of the Mont Pèlerin Society in 1974.

Philip Mirowski & Dieter Plehwe (eds.), The Road from Mont Pèlerin, loc. 298