Transcript These Neoliberal Times - Housing Studies Association

These Neoliberal Times: Narratives
of Success and Failure in Housing
Policy
Keith Jacobs and Tony Manzi
For any way of thought to become
dominant, a conceptual apparatus has
to be advanced that appeals to our
intuitions and instincts, to our values
and our desires as well as to the
possibilities inherent in the social
world we inhabit (Harvey, 2005, p.5)
Neoliberalism (Definitions)
• The pursuit of the disenchantment of politics
by economics (Davies, 2011, p.4)
• Elevation of market-based principles and
techniques of evaluation to the level of stateendorsed norms (Davies, 2013, p.37)
• Economics as performative (McKenzie, 2011)
• Competition and competitiveness as
unquestionable social goods (Davies, 2013,
p.x)
Viewing neoliberalism as a singular
and all-encompassing force squeezes
the capacity both for analysis and for
agency (Newman, 2012, p.158)
Neoliberalism and the Narrative of
Success
• Emergence post crisis as more politically
powerful than ever (Crouch, p.179)
• Evidence of a new global rationality (Dardot
and Laval, 2013, p.3)
• Concepts of human dignity and individual
freedom as compelling and seductive (Harvey,
2005)
• ‘Oppression through ontology and the politics
of knowledge’ (Nickel, 2007)
Narratives of Governance under
Austerity (Newman, 2012)
• Divestment – stripping away of governing
functions
• Design – expertise beyond the state
• Decentralisation – bringing governance closer
to communities
The ‘Success’ of Neoliberalism and
Housing
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Public attitudes to welfare
The narrative of austerity
Depoliticisation
New policy models as constitutive in effect
Different configurations of neoliberalism
(Larner, 2000, p.12)
It is no good simply denouncing
‘neoliberalism’ in a pejorative sense,
without also understanding the
genealogy, normativity and subtlety of
the ideas that underpin it (Davies,
2011, p.xii)
Psycho-social Explanations
• ‘Cognitive polyphasia’ (Jovchelovitch, 2002) – coexistence of different and contradictory positions
within individuals, institutions and communities
• Necessary psychical construction
• Disassociation from what we don’t like
• Avoidance of agency/culpability
• Compelling moral narrative
• Comfort in cynicism
Polyphasic Themes in Housing Debate
(adapted from Renedo and Jovechelevitch, 2007)
Structure v.
Agency
Individual v.
Collective
Principle v.
Pragmatism
Strivers v.
Scroungers
Altruism v. selfinterest
Rights v.
Responsibilities
Neoliberalism and the Housing Agenda
• Regeneration, social mix and gentrification
• Social control and the remoralisation of
society
• Welfare reform and ‘fairness’
• The restructuring of housing tenure
• Neocommunitarianism (Davies, 2012) – The
Third Way, Big Society and Blue Labour
The British state is in a system of rolling
abdication, leaving behind a partly privatised,
partly autonomised set of universal networks,
increasingly run by absentee landlords in the
form of global companies and overseas
corporate investors, that is disproportionately
funded by the poorest payers of taxes, fees and
duties, many of whom are also deeply in debt
(Meek, 2016)
Prospects for Change
• The performative power of networks –
‘everyday making’ (Davies, 2014)
• Relationship between everyday life and
systemic trends/struggles
• Developing a pro-social agenda (Jacobs, 2015)
References
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Crouch, C. (2011) The Strange Non-Death of Neoliberalism Cambridge: Polity
Dardot, P. and Laval, C. (2013) The New way of the World: On Neoliberal Society
London: Verso
Davies, J. (2011) Challenging Governance Theory: From Networks to Hegemony
Bristol: Policy Press
Davies, W. (2012) ‘The emerging neocommunitarianism’ The Political Quarterly, 83
(4), 767-776
Davies, W. (2014) The Limits of Neoliberalism: Authority, Sovereignty and the Logic of
Competition London: Sage
Harvey, D. (2007) A Brief History of Neoliberalism Oxford: Oxford University Press
Jacobs, K. (2015) ‘The allure of the Big Society’, Housing, Theory and Society, 32,1,
pp,25-38
Jovchelovitch, S. (2007) Knowledge in Context: Representations, Community and
Culture London: Routledge
Larner, W. (2000) ‘Neoliberalism, policy, ideology, governmentality’, in M De Goede
(ed.) International Political Economy and Poststructural Politics Hampshire: Palgrave
References (cont.)
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Meek, J. (2016) ‘Robin Hood in a time of austerity’, London Review of Books, 38, 4, pp.3-8
Moscivici, S. (2000) Social Representations: Explorations in Social Psychology Cambridge:
Polity Press
Newman, J. (2012) Working the Spaces of Power: Activism, Neoliberalism and Gendered
Labour London: Bloomsbury
Miller, H. (2012) Governing Narratives: Symbolic Politics and Policy Change University of
Alabama Press
Nickel, P. (2007) ‘Network governance and the new constitutionalism’, Administrative Theory
and Praxis, 29,2, pp.198-224
Renedo, A and Jovchelovitch, S. (2007) ‘Expert knowledge, cognitive polyphasia and health: a
study on social representations of homelessness among professionals working in the
voluntary sector in London’, Journal of Social Psychology, 12, 5, pp.779-790