Undoing the Demos: Neoliberalism’s Stealth Revolution (Near Future Series)

Neoliberal rationality  � ubiquitous today in statecraft and the workplace, in jurisprudence, education, and culture  � remakes everything and everyone in the image of homo oeconomicus. What happens when this rationality transposes the constituent elements of democracy into an economic register? In vivid detail, Wendy Brown explains how democracy itself is imperiled. The demos disintegrates into bits of human capital; concerns with justice cede to the mandates of growth rates, credit ratings, and investment climates; liberty submits to the imperative of human capital appreciation; equality dissolves into market competition; and popular sovereignty grows incoherent. Liberal democratic practices may not survive these transformations. Radical democratic dreams may not either. In an original and compelling theoretical argument, Brown explains how and why neoliberal reason undoes the political form and political imaginary it falsely promises to secure and reinvigorate. Through meticulous analyses of neoliberalized law, political practices, governance, and education, she charts the new common sense. Undoing the Demos makes clear that, far from being the lodestar of the twenty-first century, a future for democracy depends upon it becoming an object of struggle and rethinking.-- Provided by Publisher Neoliberal rationality -- ubiquitous today in statecraft and the workplace, in jurisprudence, education, and culture -- remakes everything and everyone in the image of homo oeconomicus . What happens when this rationality transposes the constituent elements of democracy into an economic register? In Undoing the Demos , Wendy Brown explains how democracy itself is imperiled. The demos disintegrates into bits of human capital; concerns with justice bow to the mandates of growth rates, credit ratings, and investment climates; liberty submits to the imperative of human capital appreciation; equality dissolves into market competition; and popular sovereignty grows incoherent. Liberal democratic practices may not survive these transformations. Radical democratic dreams may not either. In an original and compelling argument, Brown explains how and why neoliberal reason undoes the political form and political imaginary it falsely promises to secure and reinvigorate. Through meticulous analyses of neoliberalized law, political practices, governance, and education, she charts the new common sense. Undoing the Demos makes clear that for democracy to have a future, it must become an object of struggle and rethinking. Undoing Democracy : Neoliberalism's Remaking Of State And Subject -- Foucault's Birth Of Biopolitics Lectures : The Distinctiveness Of Neoliberal Rationality -- Revising Foucault : Homo Politicus And Homo Oeconomicus -- Disseminating Neoliberal Rationality I : Governance, Benchmarks And Best Practices -- Disseminating Neoliberal Rationality Ii : Law And Legal Reason -- Disseminating Neoliberal Rationality Iii : Higher Education And The Abandonment Of Citizenship -- Losing Bare Democracy And The Inversion Of Freedom Into Sacrifice. By Wendy Brown. Includes Bibliographical References And Index. Contents Preface Neoliberal Reason and Political Life I Undoing Democracy II Foucault’s Birth of Biopolitics Lectures III Revising Foucault Disseminating Neoliberal Reason IV Political Rationality and Governance V Law and Legal Reason VI Educating Human Capital Epilogue Notes Index This is a book for the age of resistance, for the occupiers of the squares, for the generation of Occupy Wall Street. The premier radical political philosopher of our time offers a devastating critique of the way neoliberalism has hollowed out democracy