The Chile Project: The Story of the Chicago Boys and the Downfall of Neoliberalism

“A fascinating account of how the ‘Chicago Boys’ came to dominate Chilean policymaking under Pinochet and beyond. Edwards doesn’t hide his own sympathies for their ideas. But even critics of Chicago-style economics will benefit from this finely detailed story about how once-outlandish ideas, scorned by politicians and businesspeople alike, became the established norm.”—Dani Rodrik, author of Straight Talk on Trade

"In this well-written, deeply researched, and novel history, Edwards brilliantly shows how free-market economics first won and then lost the war of political ideas."—John H. Cochrane, author of The Fiscal Theory of the Price Level

“Liberalism is the strange modern notion that no one should have a master, no one should be a slave to husband or state functionary. Edwards shows from the inside, with massive documentation expressed in vigorous prose, that true liberalism must always be defended rhetorically. The tragedy of Chile, and of some other neoliberalisms, is that the economists whom I and others taught in the 1970s at the University of Chicago went home and made a deal with an authoritarian devil. Imposing liberalism does not produce a culture of liberty. It must grow, as it can, in the human heart.”—Deirdre Nansen McCloskey, author of Why Liberalism Works

“The ‘Chicago Boys’—Chilean scholars trained in neoliberal economics in Chicago—are credited and blamed for everything that has gone right and wrong in their country. Sebastian Edwards trains new light on their history and shows how it illuminates everything from the dictatorship of Augusto Pinochet to the nationwide protests of 2019–2020, the election of President Gabriel Boric in 2021, and the unsuccessful constitutional referendum of 2022. A highly original window on fifty years of Chilean political and economic history.”—Barry Eichengreen, author of The Populist Temptation