Overcoming neoliberalism.

Abstract

Psychology may have to get seriously political as human aims in living and selfhood itself are increasingly influenced in a deleterious manner by the vicissitudes of living in a neoliberal political economy and 1-sided "enterprise culture" (Martin & McLellan, 2013;Sugarman, 2015). This article reviews recent writings of several social critics, including Jackson Lears (2015), Sebastion Junger (2015), Philip Blond (2010), and Christopher Lasch (1995), who richly flesh out the picture of this detrimental state of affairs. We note that many of these critics have little to say about credible alternatives to neoliberalism. The article then seeks to identify resources within theoretical and philosophical psychology, including hermeneutic philosophy and interpretive social science, for helping to overcome neoliberalism. They might help clarify and nurture a renewed democratic populism or engaged democratic politics and contribute to gaining what Lasch termed a much-needed "wisdom of limits" in today's society.

Homo neoliberalus: From personality to forms of subjectivity

“…The description of the NLFS is a collective project and should not end with an individual attempt that itself appears located within the logic of neoliberalism (as reflected, for instance, in practices of neoliberal publishing). Clear articulations of the NLFS allow one to identify tendencies such as its colonizing function, from which resistances can be envisioned (see also Richardson, Bishop, & Garcia-Joslin, 2018). One can conceive of alternative forms of subjectivity against the trend in capitalist and advanced-capitalist countries to reduce subjectivity one-dimensionally.…”

Whither decolonisation? Indigenous scholars and the problem of inclusion in the neoliberal university

“…In recent years, a surge of writing about the role of happiness in public life has appeared in the fields of psychology, management, economics, public policy, marketing and organisational theory (Binkley, 2011). Also referred to as the ‘happiness turn’ (Ahmed, 2007: 7), this is a network of discourses that is aligned with neoliberal strategies of governmentality; in particular, the production of a distinctively neoliberal subjectivity (Richardson et al, 2018). Echoing C.…”

Feminism, psychology, and the gendering of neoliberal subjectivity: From critique to disruption

“…Conjunctural analysis examines how hegemony is achieved by examining the nature of the commonsense ideas that hold it together and, importantly, how to develop counter-hegemonic discourses especially in moments of crisis or threat to the dominant order (as in periods of financial crisis, for example). For feminist psychologists, conjunctural analysis may provide a framework for unraveling how the “common sense” ideas of neoliberalism and postfeminism have taken root, and how to develop counter-hegemonic discourses as we begin to imagine “a murky future where a new social imaginary may be born” (Richardson, Bishop, & Garcia-Joslin, 2018, p. 17).…”