Progressive neoliberalism and self-entrepreneurship. Notes on the limits of Foucauldian analysis of neoliberal subjectivity

Abstract

This article proposes an analysis of current forms of neoliberalism that takes at its starting point the works of Michel Foucault. From this view, neoliberalism is understood as an organization of power that doesn’t work only through the control of the economy, but essentially through the constitution of certain forms of subjectivity. We will defend the thesis that the promises that have maintained for decades these models of subjectivity, have entered into an irreversible crisis since 2008 with the collapse of “progressive neoliberalism”. The Foucauldian model, which allowed us to analyze this expansive neoliberalism, then faces certain problems because of the retreat towards an increasingly authoritarian power that seems to promote recessive forms of subjectivity. With the help of authors such as Nancy Fraser, Maurizio Lazzarato, Wendy Brown or William Davies we will try to present a map of these problematizations of the Foucauldian analysis of neoliberalism with the aim of overcoming some problems to which it has been doomed in the new context.