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Talk:Friedrich Hayek/Archive 2

< Talk:Friedrich Hayek
Latest comment: 3 years ago by FeydHuxtable in topic GA Review
Archive 1Archive 2

Hayek's views on Pinochet's Chile

Latest comment: 10 years ago1 comment1 person in discussion

Why is the following unsourced apologetic remark included here? "Hayek, of course, had lived his early life under the mostly liberal, but mostly non-democratic, rule of the Austro-Hungarian Emperor, and Hayek had seen democracy descend into illiberal tyranny in a host of Central and Eastern European countries." This is extremely un-encyclopedic and serves no other purpose than to arouse sympathy for Hayek's controversial support of neo-fascist dictator Pinochet. I recommend immediate removal. 62.238.249.71 (talk) 14:54, 25 December 2013 (UTC)

Confusing phrase

Latest comment: 10 years ago1 comment1 person in discussion

Confusing phrase: "the economics of extending the length of production". What does this even mean? — Preceding unsigned comment added by 84.226.173.40 (talk) 11:44, 16 February 2014 (UTC)

Assessment comment

Latest comment: 18 years ago1 comment1 person in discussion

The comment(s) below were originally left at Talk:Friedrich Hayek/Comments, and are posted here for posterity. Following several discussions in past years, these subpages are now deprecated. The comments may be irrelevant or outdated; if so, please feel free to remove this section.

The article covers the subject very well. The picture, infobox, and subheaders help make it a better article. Good amount of references too. However, more links should be added at the end, and a copyedit would be helpful. Green caterpillar 14:20, 10 September 2006 (UTC) This article is one of wiki's worst examples of idol-worshipping hagiography. It ignores notable criticisms by the likes of Amartya Sen,Emma Rothschild, Pat Devine, Michael A. Lebowitz, John McMurtry, Maurice Dobb, Chris Harman and Hilary Wainwright to name just a few of the direct and relatively recent confrontations with his work. And since the contributors here are all true-believers to the last man, claims about Hayek's status, particularly in the field of sociology, have been predictably exaggerated.70.55.81.133 17:40, 10 September 2006 (UTC)

Last edited at 02:57, 15 May 2015 (UTC). Substituted at 20:27, 3 May 2016 (UTC)

Religion - Clarity needed

Latest comment: 9 years ago5 comments3 people in discussion

At one point this article refers to Hayek as a non-practicing Roman Catholic and at another it refers to him as an agnostic. Please could the article be 'cleaned-up' to verify which of these best describes Hayek's religious views. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 129.215.230.135 (talk) 17:52, 1 February 2014 (UTC)


To add to the above, I was unable to find any reference to Hayek's agnosticism in the supporting source. The chapter mentioned is freely available on google books, and I think a proper citation is in order, to verify the statement in question. Furthermore, it would be exceedingly strange for this to be possible, as that same book states twice and unambiguously that, "Hayek was a Catholic" (p.161) and "In December 1980, Hayek was one of twelve Catholic Nobel laureates..." (p.301), while words agnosticism and agnostic do not occur at all there. If no one has valid references to the contrary, I will replace the statement "Hayek was an agnostic" with "Hayek was a Catholic" after some time. BijouTrouvaille (talk) 15:16, 16 December 2014 (UTC)

See p. 13.[1] It seems he was not a believer, at least at some point. I do not think the other quotes say he was unambiguously Catholic. More likely he was nominally Catholic. I suggest we remove the line. TFD (talk) 15:28, 16 December 2014 (UTC)
You may be right. It seems he was very reserved in discussing his religious views and so there is conflicting information present. Perhaps this topic deserves a few more sentences than just a line of declaration; I'll do some research to try to put together a more complete story. Meanwhile, I agree with your suggestion. BijouTrouvaille (talk) 17:41, 16 December 2014 (UTC)
It could be if Hayek and his biographers paid little attention to the issue in their writings, that it is unimportant, beyond that he grew up in a Catholic household. TFD (talk) 06:09, 18 December 2014 (UTC)

Shouldnt we make a new section regarding his death? instead of the recognition section?

Latest comment: 9 years ago1 comment1 person in discussion

Shouldnt we make a new section regarding his death? instead of the recognition section? — Preceding unsigned comment added by Marcosoldfox (talk • contribs) 05:22, 23 April 2015 (UTC)

Latest comment: 9 years ago1 comment1 person in discussion

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Hayek & Chicago School

Why is he put within the Chicago School tradition? He is squarely in the Austrian camp. There are different branches within the Austrian school of which Hayek is apart of the Wieserian line & while it has some common tenets with Neoclassical Economics it leans more towards the Bawerkian line. I think that Chicago School should be removed from the tradition field. GRosado 02:02, 13 December 2015 (UTC) — Preceding unsigned comment added by GRosado (talk • contribs)

Dr. Schnabl's comment on this article

Latest comment: 8 years ago1 comment1 person in discussion

Dr. Schnabl has reviewed this Wikipedia page, and provided us with the following comments to improve its quality:


I believe the article is pretty good and I find it accurate. If I had to improve the article, I would indicate the ways in which Hayek's work has influenced the current debate as well as the development of economics (point 3 - influence and recognition).

In particular, I suggest to add the following section on Hayek's influence:

3.2 Hayek’s influence on contemporary macroeconomic policy discussions

Hayek’s ideas on spontaneous order and the importance of prices in dealing with the knowledge problem has inspired a debate on economic development and transition economies after the fall of the Berlin wall. For instance P. Boettke [1] elaborated in detail on why reforming socialism failed and the Soviet Union broke down. Ronald McKinnon [2] uses Hayekian ideas to describe challenges of transition from a centralized state and planned economy to a market economy. Former World Bank Chief Economist William Easterly emphasizes why foreign aid tends to have no effect at best in bestsellers such as White Man’s Burden [3]. Since the 2007-8 financial crisis there is a renewed interest in Hayek’s core explanation of boom-and-bust cycles, which is often taken as alternative explanation to that of the savings gut as launched by Bernanke. Building on Hayek's understanding of credit cycles, economists at the Bank of International Settlements, e.g. William White, have emphasized the impact of monetary policies and credit growth as root cause of financial cycles [4]. A. Hoffmann and G. Schnabl [5] provide an international perspective and explain recurring financial cycles in the world economy since the 1980s as consequence of gradual interest rate cuts led by the central banks in the large advanced economies. N. Cachanosky [6] outlines the impact of US monetary policy on the production structure in Latin America, a central element in Hayek's Prices and Production.

In line with Hayek's core ideas, an increasing number of contemporary researchers sees expansionary monetary policies and too low interest rates as mal-incentives and main drivers of financial crises in general, and the subprime market crisis in particular [7][8]. To prevent problems caused by monetary policy Hayekian/Austrian economists discuss alternatives to current policies and organizations. For instance L. White favors free banking in the spirit of Hayek’s “Denationalization of Money”[9].

Hayek’s ideas currently find their way into the discussion of the post-Great Recession issues of secular stagnation. Monetary policy and mounting regulation is argued to have undermined the innovative forces of the market economies. Quantitative easing following the financial crises is argued to have not only conserved structural distortions in the economy, leading to a fall in trend-growth, it also created new distortions and contributes to distributional conflicts.[10]

[1] Boettke, WHY PERESTROIKA FAILED The Politics and Economics of Socialist Transformation, Routledge (1993) [2] McKinnon, Spontaneous Order on the Road Back from Socialism: An Asian Perspective. American Economic Review (1992). [3] W. Easterly, The White Man's Burden: Why the West's Efforts to Aid the Rest Have Done So Much Ill and So Little Good [4] William White, Macroeconomics is on the wrong track: https://www.imf.org/external/pubs/ft/fandd/2009/12/pdf/white.pdf [5] Hoffmann and Schnabl, A Vicious Cycle of Manias, Crises and Asymmetric Policy Responses - An Overinvestment View. Published in The World Economy 34, 3, 382-403 (2011). Hoffmann and Schnabl, Monetary Policy, Vagabonding Liquidity and Bursting Bubbles in New and Emerging Markets - An Overinvestment View. Published in The World Economy 31, 9, 1226-1252 (2008). [6] Cachanosky 2014, The Effects of U.S. Monetary Policy in Colombia and Panama (2002-2007) [SSRN version] The Quarterly Review of Economics and Finance 54.3:428-436. [7] John Taylor https://ideas.repec.org/p/nbr/nberwo/13682.html [8] Brunnermeier, Markus K, and Isabel Schnabel. “Bubbles and Central Banks: Historical Perspectives”. Central Banks at a Crossroads: What Can We Learn from History? . Cambridge, UK: Cambridge University Press, 2016. [9] Lawrence White on Monetary Policy, Free Banking and the Financial Crisis: http://mercatus.org/video/lawrence-h-white-monetary-policy-free-banking-and-financial-crisis [10] Hoffmann and Schnabl, Adverse Effects of Unconventional Monetary Policy, Cato Journal 2016, http://papers.ssrn.com/sol3/papers.cfm?abstract_id=2747865


Hayek also had a large influence on law and economics, neuroscience as well as information economics. However, these are not my area of specialization. Mario Rizzo might help fill the void there.


Many thanks,

Gunther Schnabl


We hope Wikipedians on this talk page can take advantage of these comments and improve the quality of the article accordingly.

We believe Dr. Schnabl has expertise on the topic of this article, since he has published relevant scholarly research:


  • Reference : Schnabl, Gunther, 2013. "The global move into the zero interest rate and high debt trap," Working Papers 121, University of Leipzig, Faculty of Economics and Management Science.

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Latest comment: 7 years ago1 comment1 person in discussion

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What are "systematic works in biology"

Latest comment: 5 years ago2 comments1 person in discussion

From the article: "He wrote systematic works in biology" -- what are systematic works in biology -- or systematic works in anything? Please give an example? Rhkramer (talk) 13:13, 13 January 2019 (UTC)

Ok, I found the topic of "systematics" in the field of biology (having to do with the classification of living things ala evolution). The phrase seems odd -- something like "he wrote works in the field of biological systematics" would seem to be more clear -- phrased as is it, it sounds like some system of writing or organizing works. I plan to change the page. Rhkramer (talk) 13:20, 13 January 2019 (UTC)

"The Road to Serfdom"

Latest comment: 4 years ago1 comment1 person in discussion

This section merely trumpets the book's reception, but doesn't say one fucking word about the contents. WTF??? 2607:FEA8:BFA0:BD0:982F:2CEE:3C32:5FD6 (talk) 22:35, 15 November 2019 (UTC)

Friedrich Hayek vs. Friedrich August von Hayek

Latest comment: 4 years ago13 comments3 people in discussion

The article was apparently written under the lemma Friedrich von Hayek and later transferred to Friedrich Hayek. The reason may be the error that the Austrian law on names applies to him.

Friedrich August von Hayek was born in Austria under this name, was renamed Friedrich August Hayek in 1919 by the Austrian law of abolition of nobility, emigrated before the Nazis and became a British citizen in 1938 under the name Friedrich August von Hayek (source in the article).

He is listed under this name at his places of activity (including the Austrian University of Salzburg) and received the Nobel Prize and the Decoration of Honour for Services to the Republic of Austria as Friedrich August von Hayek. The article should therefore be moved to "Friedrich August von Hayek". Agree? --Ganescha (talk) 10:47, 13 January 2020 (UTC)

He's most commonly called "Friedrich Hayek" in English-language usage, so I'd be inclined to leave it where it is - David Gerard (talk) 14:02, 13 January 2020 (UTC)
Hello David, what leads you to this impression? I found a Google research somewhere in this article's archive with the opposite result. Also in the Library of Congress [2] and all other libraries in the English speaking world he is catalogued with his full name [3]. --Ganescha (talk) 14:55, 13 January 2020 (UTC)
Casual Googling finds mostly "Freidrich Hayek" or "Freidrich A. Hayek", with some "F.A. Hayek". Maybe it's just my filter bubble - David Gerard (talk) 17:48, 13 January 2020 (UTC)
The Google query wasn't really my point. Besides, after almost a decade with the lemma "Friedrich Hayek" on Wikipedia this is no real surprise. At June 2nd, 2010 the article was moved to "Friedrich Hayek" with the justification that the full name was illegal in Austria. We now know that this is not right. Hayek was a British citizen for most of his academic career. The Austrian law is not applicable an even the Austrian president used "Friedrich August von Hayek" when he honoured him. More importantly the name "Friedrich August von Hayek" is internationally used in the academic world as you can easily see in the library catalogues and the name used by the Nobel Price Committee. The English-speaking world is no exception here. To do the crosscheck: Is there any evidence beyond Google that the name "Friedrich Hayek" is dominant in the English-speaking scientific world? --Ganescha (talk) 20:52, 17 January 2020 (UTC)
There's no reason he'd show up in the English-speaking scientific world - he wasn't a scientist. I just looked at mises.org and they seem to name him as "Friedrich Hayek" or "F. A. Hayek" - David Gerard (talk) 00:18, 18 January 2020 (UTC)
There's no right answer. The Friedrich August von Hayek Institut is at [4] not von-hayek-institut.at Pelirojopajaro (talk) 08:40, 18 January 2020 (UTC)
David, I am not sure why Hayek shouldn’t have been a scientist. Maybe you refer to the attitude that political science was no science and only natural science is. The Webster tells otherwise [5].
The Mises Institute indeed is a point.
I tried to go a little bit deeper in the subject. And, Pelirojopajaro, you are right. Hayek published under almost any variation of his name. The Friedrich-August-v.-Hayek-Institut uses the brand Hayek-Institut and the web domain hayek-institut.de. The University of Chicago refers to him as “F.A. Hayek” [6] as well as “Friedrich von Hayek” [7], while F.A. Hayek” is used significantly more often. The London School of Economics is using “Friedrich von Hayek” [8].
I already was inclined to say that Americans with their practical sense tend to use the shorter form. Yet also the Library of Congress catalogues him under his full name “Friedrich August von Hayek” [9]. Under this name he became a British citizen [10], it was probably written in his passport and the name under which he won the Nobel Price (or to avoid another dissent the Nobel Memorial Prize in Economic Sciences)[11]. So I would keep stating that “Friedrich August von Hayek” is the correct lemma in the English Wikipedia as well.--Ganescha (talk) 11:46, 18 January 2020 (UTC)
The word "economist" isn't normally regarded as a subcategory of the English word "scientist". If you want to argue that it should be, this talk page isn't the place to make that point.
You seem to have a point that you very much want to insist upon, and don't seem very interested in discussion or allowing for or engaging with countervailing evidence - David Gerard (talk) 15:08, 18 January 2020 (UTC)
Sorry, if I should have offended you. So far I have found the discussion to be constructive, even if we have not reached consensus. At least the arguments are on the table. Shall we look for a 30? --Ganescha (talk) 17:50, 18 January 2020 (UTC)

As requested for a Third Opinion I try to summarise the status of our discussion. The the reason (purported legal regulations) why this article was moved in 2010 from “Friedrich August von Hayek” to “Friedrich Hayek” actually never existed. Hayek became British citizen in 1938 under his full name. I suggested that it should be moved back to “Friedrich August von Hayek”. Usually the most common name should be the name of the article. David and I disagree what is the most common name in the English speaking world. If you ask Google it clearly is “Friedrich Hayek”. In the academic world in the contrary “Friedrich August von Hayek” as he is internationally catalogued in almost every library under this name and was awarded the Nobel Memorial Prize in Economic Sciences. Hayek himself used almost all variations of his name. David Gerard, would you like to add something? --Ganescha (talk) 14:27, 19 January 2020 (UTC)

Attempting to relitigating the move ten years ago on the basis that you think the reason was bogus is not an argument to be found at WP:COMMONNAME, which says: Wikipedia does not necessarily use the subject's "official" name as an article title; it generally prefers the name that is most commonly used (as determined by its prevalence in a significant majority of independent, reliable English-language sources) as such names will usually best fit the five criteria listed above.

The criteria are: Recognizability, Naturalness, Precision, Conciseness, Consistency. See the page for fuller details. "Friedrich Hayek" meets these.

Looking in Reliable Sources, per WP:COMMONNAME - googling '"hayek" site:ft.com' turns up a few "Friedrich von Hayek", but it's mostly "Friedrich Hayek". '"hayek" site:nytimes.com' shows a few more "von", but still mostly without. '"hayek" site:wsj.com' shows a few "von", but overwhelmingly without "von".

To quote WP:COMMONNAME:

The following are examples of the application of the concept of commonly used names in support of recognizability:
People

"Friedrich August von Hayek" is indeed his full name, but it's not a form that showed up with any frequency in the Reliable Sources.

So I think it's pretty clear that, if we go by WP:COMMONNAME, the main title should probably be without "von" - David Gerard (talk) 15:03, 19 January 2020 (UTC) 

My 3O filing was declined as the admin saw more than two involved editors. So I will open a Request for Comment.  — Preceding unsigned comment added by Ganescha (talk • contribs) 17:43, 19 January 2020 (UTC)

RfC Friedrich Hayek vs. Friedrich August von Hayek

Latest comment: 4 years ago11 comments3 people in discussion

Please find the summaries of the discussion in the section above as David and I have prepared them for a 30. I am looking forward to your feedback.--Ganescha (talk) 17:46, 19 January 2020 (UTC)

  • Without the "von". Looking in Reliable Sources, per WP:COMMONNAME - googling '"hayek" site:ft.com' turns up a few "Friedrich von Hayek", but it's mostly "Friedrich Hayek". '"hayek" site:nytimes.com' shows a few more "von", but still mostly without. '"hayek" site:wsj.com' shows a few "von", but overwhelmingly without "von". "Friedrich August von Hayek" is indeed his full name, but it's not a form that showed up with any frequency in the Reliable Sources. So I think it's pretty clear that, if we go by WP:COMMONNAME, the main title should probably be without "von". WP:COMMONNAME is a policy - a WP:LOCALCONSENSUS via RFC can't override it - David Gerard (talk) 19:22, 19 January 2020 (UTC)
    • We should not carry on with our discussion and wait for input instead. Yet just for clarification. We both agree, that the common name should be used. We do disagree whether to consult Google or look into the academic world. By the way, Rowling is catalogued in the Library of Congress under J. K. Rowling. No contradiction. Now I am silently waiting for comments. --Ganescha (talk) 11:59, 20 January 2020 (UTC)
  • It seems to me that WP:COMMONNAME should be applied to general WP:RS and not to industry use. No move seems necessary from here.-TonyTheTiger (T / C / WP:FOUR / WP:CHICAGO / WP:WAWARD) 23:47, 21 January 2020 (UTC)
  • Since David and I started the discussion, we have not been discussing whether or not to use the Common Name, but what the correct "Common Name" is. So I don't know why David brought up the "Local Consensus" issue. A look at WP:RS furthermore shows that academic sources ("Scholarship") are to a certain extent the gold standard among sources. Therefore, the use in academic libraries is preferable to the use in Google. By the way, even the examples listed under "Common Name" such as "Bill Clinton" or "J.K. Rowling" are catalogued internationally under these names. Librarians orientate themselves by the names on the publications. And in the case of Hayek it is simply predominantly "Friedrich August von Hayek". --Ganescha (talk) 11:11, 27 January 2020 (UTC)
TonyTheTiger, In this context, may I ask you to have another look at this? First of all, I do not understand what you mean by "industry use". --Ganescha (talk) 11:16, 27 January 2020 (UTC)
What it says - David Gerard (talk) 19:59, 27 January 2020 (UTC)
By industry use, I mean referring to academic journals. The fact that academic journals are the gold standard for the content of the page does not mean they are the gold standard for the name of the page. E.g., I know if I published in academic journals, I would publish under Antonio, but anyone who knows me calls me Tony. Common name is a different thing than determining the academic referrent.-TonyTheTiger (T / C / WP:FOUR / WP:CHICAGO / WP:WAWARD) 06:30, 29 January 2020 (UTC)
I suspect Ganescha's confusion is in attempting to apply something rather more like German Wikipedia rules (note use of the term "lemma" for article title) - and not understanding that the English Wikipedia rule is quite different. (e.g., en:Chrislo Haas v. de:Christian Haas (Musiker) - probably nobody except his mother ever called him "Christian".) - David Gerard (talk) 07:14, 29 January 2020 (UTC)
Thank you for this clarification. In fact Common Name and Reliable Sources are not really different from their equivalents in the German Wikipedia. What is different seems to be the common understanding of how they are to be applied. Hayek might have liked this. :-) --Ganescha (talk) 13:17, 2 February 2020 (UTC)

what needs to be mentioned

1. v Hayek was no anarcho-capitalist but is often used as a source of inspiration of them

2. v Hayek opposed the foundation of the copyright and the patent system

3. Hayek's influence on economist Milton Friedman who wrote introductions to The Road to Serfdom for both a 1971 German edition and the fiftieth anniversary edition

The article says: "In a typically bold insight, Hayek attributed the birth of civilization to private property in his book The Fatal Conceit (1988)."

This point was made much earlier by both Locke and Rousseau. Also "typically bold insight" is not very NPOV.

Agree, it was also made even earlier by Aristoteles, restated by thomas Aquinas, and a large etc. Although at the time Hayek was writing, it certainly was quite bold.

The Hayek page has a significant markup problem

...which I have not been able to figure out. Three [edit] links do not appear where they should, and then all three appear together in the wrong place. Help!

"Neo-liberal"

This Hayek page is seriously flawed. While Hayek was a proponent of capitalism and its unfettered markets, and a serious critic of "collective" social solutions, the article suggest he was a "liberal," which is far from the case. "Serfdom" to him was a government that cared about its citizens, a major tenet of liberalism and civil governance that our founders proposed. The problem is in the word "neo-liberal," a word that should never have been invented and has done immeasurable harm to political discourse. My first impression.

Critics and critiques

Latest comment: 3 years ago1 comment1 person in discussion

Sure would be nice if there could be a section that addresses this. Its absence is conspicuous for such an influential thinker. Editors' personal opinions be damned, any significant name in the history of ideas attracts likeminded and opposite-minded arguments, and it does a great disservice to both sides to try to ignore how the ideas were received. There's no reason there can't be an objective assessment of the reception of his ideas, whatever one might personally think. Looking at the archives of the Talk page, it appears that this is hardly the first time someone has requested this. It would be nice if someone would actually implement it. (I personally don't have enough background in the field to feel able to do this myself, otherwise I would.) — Preceding unsigned comment added by 2600:6C50:437F:551B:3CB1:505:63DA:3906 (talk) 07:43, 9 March 2021 (UTC)

Latest comment: 3 years ago5 comments2 people in discussion

I'm not sure I've got time to do a GAN, but like the IP editor before me, I am a worried about the dominance of primary sources, and about the quality of some sources. Hayek is a controversial person, and I thank User:BasedMises for trying to bring this to GA.

  • The Mises Institute is cited frequently. It is flagged up the the headbomb script as generally unreliable. I don't see evidence of a separate editorial process, but even if we allow for that, it falls very squarely in Hayeks tradition, and would not be the ideal source...
  • Many of the biographies do not seem to be used: delete and/or move some of them to a further reading section. Use the harv error script to detect them.
  • There are too many external links; many of them primary sources
  • Inequality and class, maybe Hayeks most controversial opinions, is almost entirely cited to himself. The more controversial, the less primary sourcing is appropriate.
  • There are many quotes, almost all from Hayek himself. The lengthty ones makes me wonder about the copyright aspects. The prose is also interspersed with quotes. Use secondary sourcing instead.
  • The article is 11,866 words long; a maximum of 8,000 - 10,000 is typically advised before splitting. But maybe removing quotes would get you far.
  • I don't see anything about controversies in the lede, which surprises me
  • The legacy section specifically should contain opinions of people who think less positively about him.

This is a difficult article to write neutrally, but I don't think we're quite there. For now, I would lean towards failing the article, but I don't have enough time to fully justify that, hence my notes on talk. FemkeMilene (talk) 21:14, 11 May 2021 (UTC)

I understand the Mises institute is likely not reliable for some things, but it is reliable for biographies. I'll make sure legacy is N-POV. Thanks for giving me suggestions, and possibly reviewing it in the future! BasedMisesMont Pelerin Society 21:22, 11 May 2021 (UTC)
As a starter I'd leave the think-tank out for sentences that are appropriately cited otherwise (like FN5, second FN6 and FN10). Arguably, these sentences are overcited anyway, so you'd solve two problems with one edit. FemkeMilene (talk) 21:55, 11 May 2021 (UTC)
The last discussion on it had a consensus against using it except for opinions on itself. Biographies were not identified as exceptions. I notice that some of the articles are excerpts from elsewhere, so you could cite those books instead, keeping in mind due weight. FemkeMilene (talk) 22:02, 11 May 2021 (UTC)
Okay. Thanks for the suggestions. I may be able to get some sources to replace the Mises Institute, but keep in mind it is among the few sources you can find for some Austrian Econ things. (just to make it clear, I don't believe they are necessarily a good source, and personally dislike them, but I will admit they are likely trustworthy on their area of expertise: Austrian economics) BasedMisesMont Pelerin Society 23:13, 11 May 2021 (UTC)

GA Review

Latest comment: 3 years ago4 comments1 person in discussion
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Reviewing
This review is transcluded from Talk:Friedrich Hayek/GA1. The edit link for this section can be used to add comments to the review.

Reviewer: FeydHuxtable (talk · contribs) 19:50, 1 July 2021 (UTC)

Lots of good work in this article, but it's quite far from meeting all GA criteria, so much so that I may not even fully assess all criteria before failing. My plan is to leave this for a week to see what if any progress is made in addressing initial concerns. So after 7 days, I'll either fail or progress to a more thorough review, which would specify numerous other improvements needed before this can pass. If we get to that stage I'll allow at least another 3 weeks for these to be attained.

@BasedMises, if this all sounds like too much hard work, no worries, just let me know & I can quick fail.

The full review will be more in depth than is standard for GA. As described here I normally like to make things real simple for the nominator when I'm reviewing, addressing minor non compliances with GA criteria myself. But this article is for von Hayek, one of the most influential figures of the 20th century. Huh, in the late 90s which was in some respects the peak of neoliberalisms intellectual influence, many commentators were saying von Hayek had turned out to have more enduring impact even than Lord Keynes! For this reason von Hayek may be worth extra effort, rather than a quick fail as is more standard for articles so far from meeting the GA criteria. But also, I'd want some said criteria to be met at a somewhat higher standard than would be required for other articles. FeydHuxtable (talk) 19:50, 1 July 2021 (UTC)

Good Article review progress box
Criteria: 1a. prose ( ) 1b. MoS ( ) 2a. ref layout ( ) 2b. cites WP:RS ( ) 2c. no WP:OR ( ) 2d. no WP:CV ( )
3a. broadness ( ) 3b. focus ( ) 4. neutral ( ) 5. stable ( ) 6a. free or tagged images ( ) 6b. pics relevant ( )
Note: this represents where the article stands relative to the Good Article criteria. Criteria marked   are unassessed

Preliminary concerns

Probably the single criteria that needs the most work is broadness. As an example, re his legacy, much of the content seems written from a POV of what might seem significant to a Chicago school adherent, rather than the broad global view that's warranted for someone as important as von Hayek. There's a very long Friedman quote starting "My interest in public policy..." just on how von Hayek influenced Friedman's intellectual development. A step in the right direction would be to replace that with a different Friedman quote that illustrates von Hayek's wider impact. Eg. "There is no figure who had more of an influence, no person had more of an influence on the intellectuals behind the Iron Curtain than Friedrich Hayek" Does this make sense?

Then you could move on perhaps to mentioning the current resurgence of von Hayek influence in Brazil. - not saying you need to do this specificially, this is more an example of the sort of broad coverage I'd want to see.

To help meet the broadness criteria more generally, it would perhaps be a big help if you read one his book length biographies. Before I began a series of major edits to bring Lord Keynes to GA status, I'd read several whole biographies including the lengthy classic by Lord Skidelsky. I'm not saying you need to read even one full bio, but it would definitely help to improve the quality of sourcing if cites from one of the more prestigious biographies were integrated into the article.

Moving on to issues that fall somewhat between the broadness & neutrality criteria, I feel theres' too much focus on von Hayek's supposed influence as an Economist (where the mainstream view tends to regard him as not being especially significant) and less so on his political influence and the fact he's been seen as perhaps the most influential public intellectual of the twentieth century

To address pure neutrality concerns, while there is a reasonable amount of criticism if one reads the whole article carefully, I feel bits are missing. The article is a little light on the criticism von Hayek got for his harsh treatment of his first wife. Before that, he was often regarded as someone of excellent personal morality. After the divorce, even Lionel Robins, who had been one of his principal benefactors & sponsors, more or less frozen him out for over a decade, he was so appalled by von Hayek's actions. It might be nice to add some of the criticism from someone like good Nicholas Wapshott, who said von Hayek was "an unashamed elitist and individualist". To be clear, I'm not saying that overall the article is unduly +ve about von Hayek, in fact I'd like to see some more key +ve criticism added as well as negative.

While its true that there's been renewed interest in von Hayek since the 2008 crises, it's also the case that overall his sort of free market thinking has lost influence since then, and this isn't sufficiently reflected in the article.

In terms of failing prose quality, one of the first things to address would be MOS:Lead compliance. And on this subject I feel the lead sentence needs tweaking. I don't think it's quite true that he's "best known for his defence of classical liberalism" I'm not sure the given source even fully supports that, and I'm not bothering to verify that as we shouldn’t be using a >30 year old source for such a key claim on such as important article. The first paragraph of the lede is all some reader will read - it warrants more attention.

I doubt many editors would have the time or energy to address enough of the above to stop me failing after the 7 days are up on 8 July. So I hope you won't be disheartened if that happens. Okay, I think that's enough for now, hopefully there's at least something of value for you in this review. FeydHuxtable (talk) 19:50, 1 July 2021 (UTC)

Review wrap up

As there's been no progress in addressing the above concerns after 7 days, the article has failed its GA nomination. Before resubmitting, I'd suggest some work should go into addressing the above, and also the GA related points mentioned on the talk page here (Some reviewers might have insisted on each point being fully addressed before passing, personally I'd have been happy to pass with about half the external links still remaining, about half the von Hayek quotes could have remained, and I'd not have insisted on uncited sources being removed as there is a case for allowing them per WP:GENREF. )

I'd guess most editors would need at least 100 hours to get this done, and further points are likely to be raised before actual promotion. This is one of the more challenging topics. On the other hand, other reviewers might be more easy going than myself, so possibly a later re-nom could succeed with less effort. Whatever you decide, thanks for the time put into improving the article. FeydHuxtable (talk) 15:47, 8 July 2021 (UTC)

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