Neoliberalism ingrained: The rise and consolidation of neoliberalism in Estonia

This article engages with discourses of freedom and liberation through neoliberalisation developed by Estonian elites during that country’s transition from Soviet domination. Building on debates about the importance of neoliberalisation as an analytic concept and about its origins, content and trajectory, the article argues that Estonians were attracted to neoliberal utopias of ‘freedom’ and ‘self-reliance’, which they saw as improvements to the life they had experienced under Soviet domination. The article argues that discourses of ‘freedom’ and the right to be a self-directed individual have acted as mobilising utopias since 1989.