A Liberalism in the Balance. John K. Galbraith between Technostructure and Countervailing Power

Abstract

The 1960s and 1970s constituted a fundamental turning point in US democracy marked by the apogee of liberalism and its crisis. In this context, one of the best known American economists, John Kenneth Galbraith, observes how technology, its constant advancement, transforms the relationship between state and market and redefines the role of institutions in society. His critique of the technostructure of the corporation, as a form of totalitarian planning that opposes and dominates the market, is aimed at revealing the project of social governance that it conceals. In his trilogy devoted to the new industrial state and what he calls the «affluent society», a new conceptualisation of social power and the possibility of re-establishing public authority over it emerges.