Corporatism is Dead! Long Live Corporatism!

Abstract

ANDREW SHONFIELD DID NOT DISCOVER THE HIDDEN AFFINITY between modern corporatism and modern capitalism. John Maynard Keynes should probably be credited with that insight, even if it is contained in just a paragraph cited in part by Shonfield) in his essay: The End of Laissez-Faire. Mihail Manoilesco, an economist of lesser renown and much less reputable politics, was probably the first to offer a systematic argument to this effect, but he located its site on the periphery of European capitalism and (mistakenly) believed that it could only be brought into existence through imposition from above, either by the state bureaucracy or by ‘un parti unique.’ For a while, Mussolini's corporativismo seemed to prove him right. With its ignominious collapse, the concept disappeared from respectable political discourse -except as an insult to throw at one's opponents.