Neoliberalism

'Did Somebody Say Neoliberalism? On the Uses and Limitations of a Critical Concept in Media and Communication Studies'

by Christian Garland

Published in tripleC - Journal for a Global Sustainable Information Society, Special Issue: Marx is Back: The Importance of Marxist Theory and Research for Critical Communication Studies Today eds. Fuchs, C. and Mosco,V.

Christian Garland, Stephen Harper

Double the Shock, with half the Therapy: Transnational capital, class configuration and the social implications of Poland’s ongoing transition to a market economy

by Stuart Shields

Competition and Change, 2007 Vol. 11 No. 4.

From Rags to Riches, the Policing of Fashion and Identity: Governmentality and What Not To Wear

by Jessica Taylor

Co-authored with Sheri Gibbings. Published in vis-à-vis: Explorations in Anthropology. Vol 10, No 1, 2010.

Even the most casual perusal of television over the past ten years should reveal an increasing number of... more Even the most casual perusal of television over the past ten years should reveal an increasing number of self-improvement reality shows. This paper explores the Learning Channel (TLC) television show What Not to Wear (WNTW), which provides fashion advice to deviant dressers. We use Foucault's concept of governmentality to understand how WNTW engages women in their own projects of self-improvement in ways that are simultaneously disciplining and pleasing. Women who participate in the show are taught by the hosts, Stacy and Clinton, how to view themselves through the gaze of an imagined middle-class public. We suggest that WNTW tells us that outward appearances are the privileged site from which identities and self can be read. Even though the goal of the show is not to change identities, many of the women claim to experience a radical transformation. These transformations are often in the direction of a new professional and feminine identity, one maintained within the structure of the show by the continuing possibility and internalization of surveillance.

The Emerging Neo-Communitarianism

by Will Davies

Forthcoming in Political Quarterly, 83: 4 Oct-Dec 2012 http://www.blackwellpublishing.com/journal.asp?ref=0032-3179

The financial crisis which began in 2007 has been widely interpreted as a crisis of neoliberalism, akin to the crisis... more The financial crisis which began in 2007 has been widely interpreted as a crisis of neoliberalism, akin to the crisis of Keynesianism of the 1970s. But there is little sign of a major paradigmatic alternative, either in theory in practice. This article looks at how the crises and failures of neoliberalism are occurring at a micro-policy level, where they are interpreted in terms of the fallibility of individual rational choice. Policy responses to this crisis, drawing on more psychologically nuanced accounts of economic behaviour, can be described as ‘neo-communitarian’, inasmuch as they echo the communitarian critique of the liberal self. Where neoliberalism rests on a vision of the individual as atomised and rational, neo-communitarianism treats individuals as governed by social norms and incentives simultaneously. And where neoliberalism subjects individuals to periodic audit organised around targets and outputs, neo-communitarianism conducts a constant audit of behavioural fluctuations in real time.

EUROPE AND THE'AMERICANIZATION'OF BRITISH SOCIAL POLICY

by John Holmwood

Opposing Neoliberalism? Poland's renewed populism and post-communist transition

by Stuart Shields

This article interrogates the social impact of neoliberalisation and the counter-hegemonic forces this has engendered... more This article interrogates the social impact of neoliberalisation and the counter-hegemonic forces this has engendered by exploring Poland's recent populist turn. It rejects methodologically nationalist attempts to isolate events in Poland from wider processes of structural change and the accompanying realignment within the global capitalist economy, analysing the implications of a number of alternative and counter-hegemonic projects to the neoliberal mainstream. The article considers whether the populist turn signals a decisive rejection of neoliberalism, despite the absence of a coherent left alternative and the fact that the anti-neoliberal alternative has come from the nationalist right, dominated by politically regressive conservative social forces who have aimed to arrest welfare cuts and end the austerity associated with Poland's seemingly endless forms of reform. While no clear anti-neoliberal strategy exists, pragmatic responses have occurred but within the structurally delimited environs of state intervention. Utilising a Gramscian critical political economy the article shows how populist counter-hegemonic forces have been co-opted and are best understood in terms of the relationship to specific conjunctural projects for the reorientation of the reproduction of capitalist social relations. The conclusion reflects on the potential for a progressive politics of a renewed Polish left to emerge.

Public policy initiatives and their impact on communities: challenges for community psychology

by Mark Burton

"Shadow-lands": A Topological Glossary (v1.1)

by Gavin Keeney

Draft 05/20/12

Post-mortem of the exhibition "'Shadow-lands': The Suffering Image", Dennys Lascelles Gallery, Deakin... more Post-mortem of the exhibition "'Shadow-lands': The Suffering Image", Dennys Lascelles Gallery, Deakin University, Waterfront Campus, Geelong, Victoria, Australia, April 18 through May 18, 2012.

See also "Fifth (Final) Circular" (05/22/12):

http://cornell.academia.edu/agencex/Talks/79406/_Shadow-lands_The_Suffering_Image

The Pedagogical Subject of Neoliberal Development

by Alvin Lim

Under review

I first started to seriously consider the pedagogical subject of neoliberal development when I began drafting a... more I first started to seriously consider the pedagogical subject of neoliberal development when I began drafting a proposed course on the challenges of development. In order for me to develop a syllabus for my proposed course, I had to understand the development challenges which emerged from Nigeria’s neoliberal transformation in the 1980s. After considering this history of neoliberal development in Nigeria, I describe a visit to the underdeveloped Koma Hills to see first hand the challenges faced by a traditional community facing the encroachment of "development." I conclude with a consideration of community service learning as a methodology for introducing my proposed students to the challenges of neoliberal development.

Educating the (neoliberal) citizen: reflections from India

by Arun Kumar

Published in 'Development in Practice'. 2012.

Citizenship has gained considerable popular currency in development and is increasingly being used to represent its... more Citizenship has gained considerable popular currency in development and is increasingly being used to represent its objectives and outcomes. The popular conceptualisations of citizenship have not remained unaffected by neo-liberalism, which has established itself firmly as the dominant development framework. In mapping the neo-liberal influences in conceptualisations and expressions of citizenship – evidenced in the work of 11 NGOs in India – the present article interrogates its limitations and effects on development outcomes. The article calls for the need to leverage the inherent plurality of citizenship more substantively by infusing the discourse of rights.

Neoliberalismus in der Krise? Krisenperzeptionen in den bundesdeutschen Krisenperzeptionen in der bundesdeutschen Öffentlichkeit

by Sebastian Levi

Die Ursachen der im Jahr 2008 begonnenen Finanz- und Wirtschaftskrise sind innerhalb der Wirtschaftswissenschaften... more Die Ursachen der im Jahr 2008 begonnenen Finanz- und Wirtschaftskrise sind innerhalb der Wirtschaftswissenschaften umstritten. Je nachdem, ob Krisendeutungen nach neoliberalen, keynesianischen oder marxistischen Mustern erfolgen, werden unterschiedliche Konsequenzen für die Stabilisierung der Wirtschaft gefordert. Dies kann Auswirkung auf die Weitergestaltung unseres Wirtschaftssystems und auf die Verteilung von Kapital haben. Diese Arbeit untersucht mittels einer qualitativ-quantitativen Inhaltsanalyse der Krisendeutungen der Magazine Spiegel und Focus im ersten Quartal 2009. Die Untersuchung zeigt, dass neoliberale Krisendeutungen noch immer dominant sind, es jedoch ernsthafte Zeichen für das (Wieder-)Erstarken des Keynesianismus gibt. Keynesianische Krisendeutungen scheinen jedoch vor allem im bürgerlichen Lager nur sehr oberflächig erkennbar. Marxistische Krisendeutungen waren zwar vorhanden, jedoch in einer so
geringen Anzahl, dass ihre Relevanz höchstens nebensächlich erscheint.

'Empresarios de nosotros mismos' Biopolítica, mercado y soberanía en la gubernamentalidad neoliberal

by Francisco Vazquez Garcia

The Evolution of British Monetary Targets, 1968 - 1979.

by Aled Davies

(Winton Institute Working Paper)

How far were monetary targets imposed on the post-1974 Labour Government by international and domestic financial... more How far were monetary targets imposed on the post-1974 Labour Government by international and domestic financial markets enthused with the doctrines of ‘monetarism’? The following paper attempts to answer this question by demonstrating the complex and contingent nature of the ascent of British ‘monetarism’ after 1968. It explains the valorisation of the ‘money supply’ which took place in post-devaluation Britain which led investors to realign their expectations with the behaviour of the monetary aggregates. After 1973, the collapse of the global fixed-exchange regime, coupled with vast domestic inflationary pressures, determined that ‘the City’ came to employ the ‘money supply’ as a convenient new measure with which to assess the ‘soundness’ of the UK Government’s economic management. The critical juncture of the 1976 sterling crisis forced the Labour Chancellor to make reluctant concessions in the way of monetary targets as part of a desperate attempt to regain market confidence. The result was to impose significant constraints on the Government’s economic policymaking freedom, as attempts were made to retain favourable money supply figures exposed to the short-term volatility of domestic and international investors.

Sense and Sensibility: Mothering practices and school choice under neoliberalism

by Andrew Wilkins

For consideration in ‘Mothering in the Age of Neoliberalism’.  M.V. Giles (ed.)

Draft copy only.
Please do not quote without permission from author.

Since the late 1970s/early 80s political and public policy opinion in England has been saturated with inflated claims... more Since the late 1970s/early 80s political and public policy opinion in England has been saturated with inflated claims to the waste and inefficiency generated through government intervention over the control and delivery of public services.  As a corrective to such top-down bureaucracy, neoliberal ideologues insist that citizens should be ‘empowered’ to pursue their own self-interest as a condition of their rights (and obligations) as consumers of public resources.  The expectation here is that market-driven reform will produce direct incentives for welfare providers to improve their services through appealing to welfare users as rational economic actors; in other words, informed and discriminating.  In the case of education, parents are expected to exercise choice over which school to send their child to.  But how do parents know how to choose and how are parents expected to know what is the ‘right’ choice? This chapter intends to move beyond the abstractions and estimations posited through government advice on choice in order to capture the fractures, tensions and dilemmas pertaining to mothers’ choice-making practices.  Utilising in-depth data taken from semi-structured interviews with several mothers, this chapter brings into question the neoliberal orthodoxy that works to subsume human behaviour to fit with a tidy, narrow utilitarian construction of the parent as consumer.  In doing so, it offers a grounded discussion of the ways in which neoliberal meanings and representations are lived as well as negotiated through sites and practices of mothering.

« The Genocidal Logic of Neoliberalism » (2008)

by Michel Weber

La Stratégie du choc, la montée d’un capitalisme du désastre (The Shock Doctrine : The Rise of Disaster Capitalism) est un essai de Naomi Klein paru en 2007 chez Acte Sud. Ce compte rendu a été publié originellement in Michel Weber et Pierfrancesco Basile (dir.), "Chromatikon IV. Annuaire de la philosophie en procès - Yearbook of Philosophy in Process", Louvain-la-Neuve, Presses universitaires de Louvain, 2008, pp. 199–207.

Seven years after her famous No Logo : No Space, No Choice, No Jobs (2000), Naomi Klein has published The Shock... more Seven years after her famous No Logo : No Space, No Choice, No Jobs (2000), Naomi Klein has published The Shock Doctrine : The Rise of Disaster Capitalism (New York, Metropolitan Books and London, Allen Lane, 2007), now available as a paperback (Penguin, 2008) and recently translated into French (La stratégie du choc. La montée d’un capitalisme du désastre, traduit par Lori Saint-Martin et Paul Gagné, Arles, Actes Sud, 2008). In this utterly lucid study, Klein’s triune thesis is bold enough : economical war (the neoliberal controlled demolition of the state), state terrorism (the systematic destruction of culture with bombs, abductions, torture, assassinations…) and “democratic” free market are three facets of the enforcement of the same ideology.

CALL FOR PAPERS: Journal Special Issue: Interventions: International Journal of Postcolonial Studies

by Karen Soldatic

CALL FOR PAPERS:
Journal Special Issue: Interventions: International Journal of Postcolonial Studies
more CALL FOR PAPERS:
Journal Special Issue: Interventions: International Journal of Postcolonial Studies

Disability and Colonialism: (dis)encounters and anxious intersectionalities

Guest Editors: Shaun Grech (Manchester Metropolitan University) & Karen Soldatic (University of New South Wales)

We are pleased to announce that we will be guest editing a special edition entitled Disability and Colonialism: (dis)encounters and anxious intersectionalities on behalf of the established refereed journal Interventions: International Journal of Postcolonial Studies.

The aim of this special issue is to position disability within the colonial (the real and imagined), through which to explore a range of (often anxious) intersectionalities as disability is theorised, constructed, and lived as a post/neocolonial condition. While postcolonial theory and associated fields (e.g. critical theory, cultural studies etc.) have engaged with race, gender and ethnicity in the exploration of themes of identity, representation, space, historicity and the neocolonial, they have almost wholly bypassed disabled people- paradoxically limited to the subjectification of the able-bodied, or rather disembodying colonialism. Westerncentric fields of study such as disability studies often remain detached from the global South, the histories, contexts and cultures of these specific geopolitical spaces, and how disability is ontologically constructed and lived through a history replete with signifiers of power and empire and that frame the global. While some have adopted colonialism as a metaphor for the experience of disability (see for example Shakespeare, 2000), of colonized bodies by the medical profession, the colonial encounter per se, its creation of and implications for the disabled subject, remains inadequately theorised. In turn, disability is persistently removed from history and any contemplation of the post or neocolonial and efforts (discursive or material) at decolonizing these spaces and those within.

The special issue aims to transcend disciplinary, epistemological, methodological, spatial and historical boundaries. Engaging indigenous, post/neocolonial, disability studies, critical theory, psychology, Latin American Cultural Studies, and a range of other perspectives and literatures, and prioritising voices from the global South, we invite authors to engage in critical debate around colonialism to explore a range of thematic concerns (not exclusively):

• Colonial representations and the construction of the disabled body and mind
• The violence and disablism of colonialism
• Intersections of race, ethnicity, culture, gender and disability
• Empire and the domestication of bodies: globalisation, economics and beyond
• Disabled identities, metaphors and language, and their roles in subjugation
• From the colonial to the post/neocolonial: disability and contemporary lineages of imperialism
• Social identities and visions of disability
• Colonial medicalisation: identifying, labelling and ‘treating’ the disabled body
• The Christianising mission, biblical renditions and the disabled subject
• Decolonizing epistemologies, practices and lives: renegotiating power and contemplating global justice

We encourage authors to engage work on Southern theory and movements and approaches prioritising and promoting Southern epistemologies and counter-hegemonic knowledges emerging from struggles for justice.

Those wishing to submit an article, please email your full manuscript to both Shaun Grech (S.Grech@mmu.ac.uk) and Karen Soldatic (ajks123@bigpond.com). Please insert ‘Submission for Disability and Colonialism Special Issue’ in the subject line. Manuscripts will be sent anonymously for double peer review, and comments and recommendations relayed to authors through the editors.

Articles should not exceed 8,000 words in length, and include a 300 word abstract. The journal style guide is available here: http://www.tandf.co.uk/journals/journal.asp?issn=1369-801X&linktype=44.

Manuscripts should be submitted by no later than: 1st January 2013

Neoliberal Construction of Crisis: Greece as an Example

by Athanasios Marvakis

in German

To understand the Greek-European “crisis” we must get rid of the notion of capitalism as a self-maintaining system, a... more To understand the Greek-European “crisis” we must get rid of the notion of capitalism as a self-maintaining system, a notion that becomes an apotheosis of capitalism despite our personal critical intentions. We must look for “subjective” interventions and interests which contribute or even construct what we perceive as “crisis”. In regard to the particular Greek context it is necessary to recognise various interlocking hinges which mediate between dominant politics and resistances: citizens as “accomplices” or “enemies” of the state; the relationship between a rudimentary and a very unjust social state; the corruption of the Greek population as a strategic deal; and a particular political culture of the Left that is founded on “ideological territorialism” and sectarianism.

‘The Return of the Referent in Recent North American Fiction: Neoliberalism and Narratives of Extreme Oppression’. Novel: A Forum on Fiction, Fall 2009.

by Jane Elliott

Globophilia (Encyclopedia Entry)

by Richard Kahn

The Wiley-Blackwell Encyclopedia of Globalization, First Edition. Edited by George Ritzer. © 2012 Blackwell Publishing Ltd. Published 2012 by Blackwell Publishing Ltd.

Krisenreaktionen in Brasilien, Indien und China

by Matthias Ebenau

[2012] Co-authored with Stefan Schmalz, this is a heavily condensed and updated presentation of some key arguments of our 2011 book; published in Das Argument 54(1-2)/296, 107-116. For details please check: http://www.argument.de/wissen_index_inhalt.html.