Consciousness and the Neoliberal Subject outlines a theory of ideological function and a range of ideological positions according to which individuals rationalise and accept socio-economic conditions in advanced consumer capitalist societies. Through a critical examination of the social and psychoanalytic theories of Herbert Marcuse, Fredric Jameson, and Slavoj Žižek, the author extends the understanding of ideology to consider not only the unconscious attachment to social relations, but also the importance of conscious rationalisation in sustaining ideologies. In this way, the book defines different ideologies today in terms of the manner in which they conditionally internalise a dominant neoliberal rationality, and considers the possibility that entrenched social norms may be challenged directly, through conscious engagement. It will appeal to scholars of social and political theory with interests in ideology, neoliberalism, psychoanalytic thought and critical theory.

Political practices, agencies and institutions around the world promote the need for humans, individually and collectively, to develop capacities of resilience. We must accept and adapt to the ‘realities’ of an endemic condition of global insecurity and to the practice of so-called sustainable development. But in spite of claims that resilience make us more adept and capable, does the discourse of resilience undermine our ability to make our own decisions as to how we wish to live? This book draws out the theoretical assumptions behind the drive for resilience and its implications for issues of political subjectivity. It establishes a critical framework from which discourses of resilience can be understood and challenged in the fields of governance, security, development, and in political theory itself. Each part of the book includes a chapter by David Chandler and another by Julian Reid that build a passionate and provocative dialogue, individually distinct and offering contrasting perspectives on core issues. It concludes with an insightful interview with Gideon Baker. In place of resilience, the book argues that we need to revalorize an idea of the human subject as capable of acting on and transforming the world, rather than being cast in a permanent condition of enslavement to it.

Following the 2007–2008 global financial crisis, a number of prominent academics, journalists, and activists were quick to pronounce the demise of neoliberal capitalism and governance. This rather optimistic prediction, however, underestimated the extent to which neoliberalism has shaped the 21st-century world order and become entrenched in our sociopolitical and cognitive fabric. Indeed, 11 years after the crisis, and in spite of the significant levels of socioeconomic inequality, psychological distress, and environmental destruction generated by neoliberal policies and corresponding business and cultural practices, the ideological hegemony of neoliberalism has not been supplanted, nor has it really faced any serious unsettling. How, then, has neoliberalism inflected and shaped our “common-sense” understandings of what is politically, economically, and culturally viable? To help answer this question, this book combines leading theories from sociology, media-communication research, developmental psychology, and cognitive science, and draws on primary evidence from a unique mix of ethnographic, survey, and experimental studies – of young people’s leisure practices and educational experiences, of young adults’ political socialisation processes in relation to exposure to social networking sites, and of the effects of commercial media viewing on material values and support for social welfare. In doing so, it provides a nuanced and robustly empirically tested account of how the conscious and non-conscious cognitive dimensions of people’s subjectivities and everyday social practices become interpellated through and reproductive of neoliberal ideology. As such, this book will appeal to scholars across the social and behavioural sciences with interests in neoliberalism, political engagement, enculturation, social reproduction, and media effects.

Michael Arribas-Ayllon uses a Foucauldian framework to discuss a genealogy of psychology in relation to recipients of welfare in Australia. Garrett Albert Duncan analyses identity models used by researchers and educators to explain black youth subjectivity in the USA. Jeff Gavin explores young adult audiences' distancing techniques in reaction to AIDS-related television - a continuation of the theme of moralisation and the pathologisation of the other. John Cromby discusses subjectivity in more theoretical terms in an essay that suggests Damasio's somatic marker approach, combined with social theory, as an important way of approaching the body and how we live embodiment. Morten Nissen interrogates the relations between subject and object in German and Scandinavian traditions of critical psychology in order to think about the idea of critical psychology as a subject science: one that blends subjectivity and objectivity. Finally, Rajen Panikkar and Mandy Morgan examine the state of 'Amok', as it appears in writings on Malaysia, and Lisa Young and Juliet Mitchell look at relations between siblings amongst World War II evacuees.

Why, since the financial crisis of 2008, has neoliberal capitalism remained seemingly impregnable? Why, when it is shown as no longer capable of delivering on its economic promises does its logic pervade all facets of contemporary life? How has it seduced us? This book examines the seductive appeal of neoliberalism by understanding it as a fundamentally counter-cultural logic. Unlike earlier modes of capitalism, neoliberalism is infused by spirit of rebellion and self-creation, with the idealised neoliberal subject overturning traditional morality whilst creating new modes of being based on risk and excess. Tracing the development of the logic of neoliberalism from its beginnings in the thought of Friedrich Hayek in the wake of the post-war period, through the work of neoconservative writers overcoming and moving beyond what they perceived as the nihilism of both the counter-culture and capitalism of the 1960s and 70s, to its establishment as a new moral order underpinning the economic system from the 1980s onwards, the author argues that it is only through a clear understanding of the seduction of neoliberalism that it can be overcome by reimagining our relationships to work and society.

In this book, DeLeon presents a critique of neoliberalism and present times through a metaphor of social collapse and considers what remains once the dust has settled for a different kind of person to emerge. Engaging a variety of social, political and educational theories, along with pop culture and literature, DeLeon positions humanity at the edges of collapse and what will emerge after the fall. Engaging academic and fictional alternatives, he imagines future possibilities through a new kind of person that rises from the rubble. Questioning the foundations of empiricism, standardization and "reproducible" results that reject new forms of social and political projects from materializing, DeLeon discusses the potentials of the imagination and the ways in which it can produce alternative possibilities for our collective future when unleashed and combined with fictional narratives. Moving across multiple intellectual, philosophical, artistic, and historical traditions, he constructs a radical, interdisciplinary vision that challenges us to think about transforming our collective future(s), one in which we construct a new kind of person ready to tackle the challenges of a potentially liberatory future and what this might entail.

This volume examines the relationship between law and sacrifice as a crucial nexus for theorizing the dynamics of creation, destruction, transcendence, and violence within the philosophical and legal discourse of western society. At a time of populist political unrest, what philosophical and theoretical resources are available for conceptualizing the discontent that seems to emanate from practically every sphere of society? What narrative strategies have been employed within literary, theological, philosophical, and legal discourse to tame or mystify human violence? Engaging with the work of preeminent theorists of sacrifice, such as Georges Bataille, René Girard, Giorgio Agamben, and Jacques Derrida this collection examines from an interdisciplinary perspective the sacrificial logic that characterizes the cultural and political dynamics of law in society. The book will be of interest to students and scholars in the field of legal theory and philosophy.