The concept of progress, i.e., an improvement or completion (in modern jargon, a rationalization) became dominant in the eighteenth century, in an age of humanitarian-moral belief. Accordingly, progress meant above all progress in culture, self-determination, and education: moral perfection. In an age of economic or technical thinking, it is self-evident that progress is economic or technical progress. To the extent that anyone is still interested in humanitarian-moral progress, it appears as a byproduct of economic progress. If a domain of thought becomes central, then the problems of other domains are solved in terms of the central domain – they are considered secondary problems, whose solution follows as a matter of course only if the problems of the central domain are solved.
– Carl Schmitt, The Concept of the Political
In an unintentional manner, Schmitt summarizes well not just the concept of progress generally, but — unintentionally — the ethos of think-tanks such as The Mises Institute, The Cato Institute, and even the Catholic-backed Acton Institute. It is the ethos of the so-called “Washington Consensus” that emerged after 1989, the consensus which gave us the World Trade Organization, NAFTA, and a global investment regime that erodes national sovereignty in the name of economic improvement. “Spread the wealth” via “free trade” and everything will fall into place: peace, security, stability, “human rights,” etc. How quickly has that dream, that myth, unraveled in the wake of the terrible realization that human souls cannot be placated with “stuff” and a life infused with meaning, even demonic meaning, has more power to move mountains than the wealth of every global elite combined.
