The friendly visit of Milton Friedman, the idol of Chicago Boys, to Pinochet was far beyond an isolated episode. The University of Chicago has already started, with state subsidies, the education of market fanatic economic cadres for Latin America as early as in the 50s. With the help of these cadres Pinochet's Chile became the first exemplar of the neoliberal model, from that Reagan's counter-revolution also gained inspiration. Friedman and other neoconservative theorists sought to give a new meaning to the idea of freedom and by this securing respect to the dictatorship of free markets.

Mainstream economics still regards the economy as the free competition between enterprises, which are small enough not to have control over the market. In fact, as John K. Galbraith has proven 40 years ago and that still holds true, developed capitalism necessary produces giant firms, which are not controlled by the market rather they control and manage it according to their self interests. Economic shocks over the past decades have not falsified this basic truth. On the contrary, recent company scandals support the fact that large firms widely manipulate the market.

In the 1970s, a counter-revolution in economics restored the neo-classical doctrines prevailing before the Great Depression. Since the 1990s, the contradictions and consequences of the emerging neoliberal order have become apparent. For analysing these, the works by J.M. Keynes and K. Polanyi are instrumental, and the proposal by the latter about economic planning and international finance on a regional scale should be revisited.