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Stefan J. Padfield

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Director of the NCPPR's Free Enterprise Project. Prior experience includes 15+ years as a law professor, two federal judicial clerkships, private practice at Cravath, Swaine & Moore, LLP, and 6 years enlisted active duty (US Army). Immigrant (naturalized).

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I recently listened to an episode of EconTalk: “Dani Rodrik on Neoliberalism.” What follows is an excerpt from the show, wherein Rodrik defines neoliberalism:

What I mean by neoliberalism is really mostly a frame of mind that places the independent functioning of markets and private incentives and pricing incentives at the center of things. And I think in the process downgrades certain other values, like equity and the social contract, and certain restraints on private enterprise that are often required to achieve economic ends that are more compatible with social goals.

For whatever it’s worth, I’d change this definition as follows:

What I mean by neoliberalism is really mostly a frame of mind that places the independent functioning of markets and private incentives and pricing incentives at the center of things. And I think in the process [posits that] certain other values, like equity and the social contract, and certain restraints on private enterprise that are often required to achieve economic ends that are more compatible with social goals [are optimized via free markets compared to the historical failures of central planning].

Two other comments from the show that stuck out to me:

  • what both Foxconn and the

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This past Friday, I had the privilege of attending the First Annual ISG/Corporate Issuers Conference, hosted by the Investor Stewardship Group (ISG) and the John L. Weinberg Center for Corporate Governance at the University of Delaware. The Investor Stewardship Group is “an investor-led effort that includes … more than 60 U.S. and international institutional investors with combined assets in excess of US$31 trillion in the U.S. equity markets,” which was formed “to establish a framework of basic investment stewardship and corporate governance standards for U.S. institutional investor and boardroom conduct.”[1] The John L. Weinberg Center for Corporate Governance “is one of the longest-standing corporate governance centers in academia, and the first and only corporate governance center in the State of Delaware, the legal home for a majority of the nation’s public corporations.”[2] Charles M. Elson is the Edgar S. Woolard, Jr., Chair in Corporate Governance and the Director of the Weinberg Center.[3]

The primary work product of the ISG is the “framework for U.S. Stewardship and Governance comprising of a set of stewardship principles for institutional investors and corporate governance principles for U.S. listed companies. The corporate governance framework articulates six principles that the ISG believes are fundamental to good corporate governance at U.S. listed companies.” Meanwhile, the “stewardship framework seeks to articulate a set of fundamental stewardship responsibilities for institutional investors.” The Framework “became effective on January 1, 2018.”[4]

The agenda for the conference included a “deep-dive” into both the ISG Stewardship Principles and ISG Corporate Governance Principles, as well as “Fireside Chat” consisting of Charles Elson interviewing Marty Lipton. What follows, in no particular order, are three of my reflections on the conference. The Chatham House Rule applied, so I will not attribute any statements to any particular speakers.

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