Dhaka, May 3 -- Around the world, populist nationalism is on the rise, often shepherded to power by authoritarian leaders. And yet the neoliberal orthodoxy - government downsizing, tax cuts, deregulation - that took hold some 40 years ago in the West was supposed to strengthen democracy, not weaken it. What went wrong?

Part of the answer is economic: neoliberalism simply did not deliver what it promised. In the United States and other advanced economies that embraced it, per capita real (inflation-adjusted) income growth between 1980 and the COVID-19 pandemic was 40% lower than in the preceding 30 years. Worse, incomes at the bottom and in the middle largely stagnated while those at the very top increased, and the deliberate weakening of...