Significantly enough, even this relatively nonspecific and anodyne set of neoliberal ten commandments proved too contentious to gain the assent of the individualists gathered at Mont Pèlerin, and so the oxymoronic Committee of Individualists deputed a redraft to Lionel Robbins, who complied and produced the “Statement of Aims” (reproduced below). All those gathered on April 8, 1947, except one (the French economist and Nobel laureate Maurice Allais) fully accepted this rather less informative manifesto, which to this day remains the only “official” statement of the MPS. Thus, our readers should understand that they cannot look to any formal sanctioned publication of the MPS for a convenient definition of neoliberalism. Furthermore, this is precisely what we should expect even if the MPS had been convened in 1947 to construct a new version of liberalism, rather than simply codify what had been received hallowed wisdom.

Philip Mirowski & Dieter Plehwe (eds.), The Road from Mont Pèlerin, loc. 140