Project

The international symposium is an integral part of a larger research project entitled “The Many Faces of Liberalism” launched in January 2019 at the University of Tours. A series of monthly public seminars were initially organised. Each of these multi-discipline seminars has focused on a specific geographical area exploring the dimensions of neoliberalism in the UK, the US, across the rest of the Americas, and in the EU. A large team of researchers has shed light on the emergence of (neo)liberalism from the perspective of intellectual history and on the impact it has had on banking, finance and trade. The transformative effects that (neo)liberalism has had on the Welfare State (with particular regard to the areas of health, disability and education) as well as on legal and political institutions have also come under scrutiny.

The team that initiated the project comprises researchers from ICD and IRJI François Rabelais, two research centres based in the University of Tours.

ICD (Cultural and discursive interplays – EA 6297)

Research unit, part of the “Humanities and Foreign Languages” Doctoral School (ED 616, Orléans-Tours).

The multidisciplinary research unit ICD, which was formed in 2012, has four research teams in Literature, Foreign Languages, and Humanities (CIREMIA, GRAAT, Histoire des Représentations et RTmus) within the Literature, Foreign Languages and Humanities faculties at the University of Tours. It is made up of about 80 faculty researchers (including 30 Readers) and 45 PhD students in nine different disciplines.

The project entitled “The Many Faces of Liberalism” is part of ICD’s 2018-2023 research programme dedicated to “Liberty”. It is particularly relevant to the programme first research theme: “Culture and Politics, Colonial and Post-colonial Studies”. Building on past research on specific events in Anglo-American history, the current project embodies the cross-sectoral approach that characterises the unit. As such, not only is it aimed at specialists in Anglo-American studies, but also at those working on German, Spanish, Latin-American and Italian studies as well as philosophy and intellectual history.

IRJI François Rabelais (Multidisciplinary Law Research Institute – EA 7496)

Research unit, part of the “Social Sciences and Society” Doctoral School (ED 240, Orléans-Tours).

Created in 2018 out of the merger of three legal research groups (CRDP, LERAP and GERCIE) of the Law Faculty of Tours, IRJI now comprises 59 faculty researchers and 68 PhD students, from five different disciplines.

This symposium encompasses two major research themes – “Democracies, Freedoms, and Social Policies” and “Standards and Institutions in Europe”. It contributes to enhancing our understanding of the way law develops while also enabling an analysis of the interplay and influences between national, European and transcontinental legal systems. By highlighting points of convergence and elements of profound disparity created by the structural specificities of the countries under consideration the symposium also contributes to the comparative analysis of the transformations that the economic and financial spheres have undergone.