An Army of Debt

Montegary, Liz

doi:10.1080/09502386.2015.1017138

Cited by 4 publications

(6 citation statements)

References 13 publications

(7 reference statements)

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“…Similar to previous research, our analysis suggests that the concern of financial literacy is best understood in relation to financialization (Beggs, Bryan, and Rafferty 2014;Gonzalez 2015;Lazarus 2020;Montegary 2015;Pellandini-Simányi, Hammer, and Vargha 2015) and that financial education is a form of governmentality that seeks to shape financial subjects (Clarke 2015; Lazarus 2020; Marron 2014). Likewise, our analysis of ethnographic material demonstrates that the goal of financial education in Sweden is to adjust and encourage citizens to take advantage of financialization, thereby responsibilizing them for their own welfare; we have shown that this is an emotional endeavor.…”

Section: Resultssupporting

confidence: 77%

“…From this critical perspective, financial education it is not a neutral endeavor, but rather, one that contributes to the naturalization of a particular ideological discourse of financial markets (Lazarus 2020). Scholars argue that the increasing focus on citizens' financial literacy is best understood in relation to the financialization of everyday life, a development whereby financial markets play an increasingly important role in personal finances via the extended use of financial products such as mortgages, credit products of all kinds, and pension savings schemes (Beggs, Bryan, and Rafferty 2014;Gonzalez 2015;Lazarus 2020;Montegary 2015;Pellandini-Simányi, Hammer, and Vargha 2015). Some scholars of the financialization of everyday life argue that this development also cultivates financial subjects.…”

Section: Financial Education Financialization and Emotions In Financementioning

confidence: 99%

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Governing by emotions in financial education

Pettersson

Wettergren

2020

Consumption Markets & Culture

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In line with previous research, we consider financial education to be a form of governmentality in the age of financialization. Applying sociological theory of emotions, we investigate the role emotion play in the attempt to govern citizens in Swedish financial education. The material consists of interviews with organizers of the Swedish Like Your Personal Finance educational network and observations of one of its courses, Secure Your Financial Future. Analyzing how citizens are taught financial literacy, we highlight key emotions and feeling rules that promote the financial rationality permeating financial education. The results show that the course establishes a narrative of the world economic situation that responsibilizes citizens for their own financial security and welfare, employing feeling rules about: boredom, fear/ anxiety, trust/distrust, and fun, which constitute the financially rational subject.

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Section: Resultssupporting

confidence: 77%

Section: Financial Education Financialization and Emotions In Financementioning

confidence: 99%

Governing by emotions in financial education

Pettersson

Wettergren

2020

Consumption Markets & Culture

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“…An important consideration in my analysis of Swedish financial education is neo-liberalization's co-constitutive trend of financialization: a development whereby financial markets and products play an increasingly dominant role in economies and societies (Epstein 2005, Krippner 2005, Leyshon and Thrift 2007, Lapavitsas 2011, Davis and Kim 2015. In its progression, financialization has also drawn not only the middle class but also low-income and other marginalized groups into financial markets by such means as mortgages, an array of credit products and pension savings, as well as predatory lending practices such as payday loans (James 2014, Montegary 2015, Kirwan 2019, Montgomerie 2020. Research has shown how the increased interest and focus on consumers' so-called financial literacy is linked to financialization (Finlayson 2009, Beggs et al 2014, Marron 2014, Gonzalez 2015, Montegary 2015, Pellandini-Simányi et al 2015, Lazarus 2020, Weiss 2020.…”

Section: Financialization and The Problematization Of Financial Literacymentioning

confidence: 99%

The problematization of consumers in Swedish financial literacy education

Pettersson

2021

Cultural Studies

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Using the concept of problematization, this paper reveals the rationale for governing consumers in the practice of Swedish financial literacy education. Before the 1980s, the problematization of consumers was characterized by teaching economic thrift to 'at-risk groups'. Through observations of and interviews with teachers and organizers, as well as analyzes of policy texts, this study shows that contemporary financial education instead describes a whole population of consumers lacking 'financial self-confidence'. This study also shows how social, political, and economic developments prompted the problematization of the previously unnoticed issue of Swedish citizens' 'financial literacy'. Neo-liberal ideas and reforms, financialization, and the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development's promotion of financial literacy are all strong factors in the current problematization of Swedish consumers and the ongoing practice of financial education. Financial education attempts to foster economically rational, responsible, self-reliant financial citizens; in other words, it seeks to make people more like the 'virtual consumer' of neo-classic economic theory. The ideal consumer of contemporary financial education is expected to turn to financial markets to ensure his or her economic welfare. Doing so is assumed to lead consumers to contribute to efficient and stable global and national financial markets. However, consistent with the local problematization of Swedish consumers as having diverse problems and needs in relation to finance, such education is adjusted to fit different categories of consumers. While some are said to require financial 'inspiration' to become active and engaged financial consumers, the traditional morality of thrift still characterizes financial education tailored for consumers deemed to be at risk of over-indebtedness.

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“…In part this is because contemporary relations of credit invariably involve the explicit enactment of bodily difference in and amongst populations of debtors. In Liz Montegary's (2015) contribution to the issue we see how the particularly ambivalent figure of the US soldier-debtor and the surrounding familial relations become enmeshed in a range of gendered and racialized practices as translated through forms of debt-led financialization. At the same time, she highlights the way that relations of debt, promise and obligation can and often do circulate far beyond the formally delimited credit product.…”

Section: Everydayness or The Affective Materiality Of Credit And Debtmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…These concern what we refer to as the 'intimacies' of debt (Allon 2015, Kish and Leroy 2015, Montegary 2015, Wilson and Yochim 2015, its 'localities' (Halawa 2015, Pellandini-Simanyl et al 2015, its 'moralities' (González 2015, Wilkis 2015 and its 'technologies' (Aitken 2015, Lopes 2015, Tiessen 2015, Yudin and Pavlyutkin 2015. These basic categorizations allow for a respective set of emphases upon how credit and debt shape and are shaped by the lived-immediate and the elasticities/constrictions of the economic ('intimacies'), by the specific places and tempos/temporalities that these affectual materialities pass through ('localities'), by the production and contestation of an ethico-aesthetics of daily practices ('moralities') and by the ever-evolving agencement (moving through them all) with highly specific socio-technical apparatuses ('technologies').…”

Section: Scenes From An Issue (Moments/totalities)mentioning

confidence: 99%