1 / 18

SOCI 2070 Financial Fitness

SOCI 2070 Financial Fitness. Today’s Class. A New Common Sense (a discourse) From Welfare to Workfare (government practice) Some Consequences of Financial Fitness. Today’s Readings.

dkeyser
Download Presentation

SOCI 2070 Financial Fitness

An Image/Link below is provided (as is) to download presentation Download Policy: Content on the Website is provided to you AS IS for your information and personal use and may not be sold / licensed / shared on other websites without getting consent from its author. Content is provided to you AS IS for your information and personal use only. Download presentation by click this link. While downloading, if for some reason you are not able to download a presentation, the publisher may have deleted the file from their server. During download, if you can't get a presentation, the file might be deleted by the publisher.

E N D

Presentation Transcript

  1. SOCI 2070Financial Fitness

  2. Today’s Class A New Common Sense (a discourse) From Welfare to Workfare (government practice) Some Consequences of Financial Fitness

  3. Today’s Readings Paul du Gay ‘Representing “Globalization”: Notes on the Discursive Orderings of Economic Life’, 114-121, 124-125. Alan Sears “The Lean State and Capitalist Restructuring”, 99-108. Jaques B. Gelinas “The Seven Articles of the Globalization Creed”, 120-22. Talbot Stevens, Financial Freedom Without Sacrifice, 1-13. Natalie Southworth,“Survivor: Just Another Day at the Office”, Globe & Mail, 22 Aug. 2000. Theresa Ebden, “Kicking the Habit: A 12-Step Program to Life Without Survivor”, Globe and Mail, 21 August 2000. Supplementary Readings: Doug Henwood, “The Americanization of Global Finance”, 12-23.

  4. Financial Fitness–“A neoliberal discourse about the responsibility of individuals to participate in financial culture in prescribed ways, such as by using credit cards and repaying the monthly balance. A form of self-care, similar to diet and exercise, personal money management is thought to be important to individual and national financial health.”from Mary Beth Raddon “Financial Fitness” in Deborah Brock, Rebecca Raby and Mark Thomas, eds., Power and Everyday Practices Nelson, forthcoming, February 2011.

  5. Financial Fitness (a discourse) Anything that might seem to have a bearing on economic life…is assessed…primarily in terms ofits consequences for promoting or inhibiting the pursuit of national economic efficiency” Paul du Gay

  6. Financial Fitness (a discourse) ‘The market’ is the ultimate authority governing economic and social life Efficiency, productivity and growth occurs through free markets Reduce government regulation Governments should run “like a business” Provide a minimum of public goods and services Privatize the public sector Design policies to promote competitiveness Individuals should embrace market principles Become ‘financially fit’ Achieve individual security through smart investment Economic rationality extends throughout society A new “common sense”

  7. The Old ‘Common Sense’ Keynesian welfare states (1940s to 1970s) Economic growth requires government intervention and investment Full employment Social Wage (social security) Labour-Capital ‘accord’

  8. Creating a new common sense “the aim is to change the soul” The Trilateral Commission, US, 1970s Margaret Thatcher, UK, 1970s-1980s Ronald Reagan, US, 1980s

  9. Bringing FF to Canada Trudeau, 1970s and 1980s Legislate wage controls Mulroney, 1980s Canada-U.S. free trade agreement Chretien, 1990s Cut funding to social programs NAFTA

  10. Financial Fitness (government practice) Political institutions protect class interests “The executive of the modern state is but a committee for managing the common affairs of the whole bourgeoisie” Marx and Engels

  11. Financial Fitness A new “common sense” ‘The market’ is the ultimate authority governing economic and social life Governments and individuals need to embrace market principles We can achieve individual security and growth through smart investment

  12. Consequences of “Financial Fitness” Hide the Human Effects of Corporate Power Create “entrepreneurs of the self” Turn Education into a Commodity

  13. 1 - Hide Effects of Corporate Power From Roger and Me Inevitable corporate decisions as a result of ‘market forces’ Job losses from corporate restructuring Market will ‘correct itself’ Individual financial ruin from investments gone bad New opportunities in the ‘new economy’ From GM to Taco Bell

  14. 2 - Create “Entrepreneurs of the Self” “governance of self” based on business principles Competitive, instrumental, individualist Individually responsible for own self-advancement and care Manage the business of our own lives through individual investment, etc. The “lean person”: “organizes her or his life around lean principles, avoiding waste and dependence…” Sears, p. 103

  15. 3 - Make Education a Commodity Run government like a business Privatize public services Introduce/increase user-fees for public services Market discipline for public sector workers

  16. 3 - Make Education a Commodity Education reform in Ontario in the 1990s Create a ‘crisis’ to promote a new ‘common sense’ The system is not working: Out of date Inefficient Unresponsive to change

  17. 3 - Make Education a Commodity Bring market principles into public education Socialize students for the ‘new economy’ Make programs ‘job relevant’ Commercialize campuses Corporate sponsorships Market discipline for education workers Contract teaching Turn public service into individual investment User pay = higher tuition

  18. The End of Neoliberalism? • “Neo-liberal market fundamentalism was always a political doctrine serving certain interests. It was never supported by an economic theory. Nor, it should now be clear, is it supported by historical experience. Learning this lesson may be the silver lining in the cloud now hanging over the global economy”. Joseph Stiglitz, “A Global Lesson in Market Failure” Globe and Mail, July 7, 2008, A17

More Related