| This dissertation develops an account of popular articulations and receptions of economic politics and policy. Political theorists tend to view the economy from a systemic or institutional level and identify the politics of economics with elite-driven policy. The popular bases of market-based reform, on the other hand, are interpreted through the heuristic of neoliberal subjectivities. However the subjectivities approach also focuses on generalized discourses that are said to shape subjects. This project attends to the subcultural activity through which diverse groups crystallized market-reform ideologies in the US since the 1980s. Looking to sites of publicity and politicization of the family, I make the case that as actors attempted to navigate late liberal forms of work and family life, they bent towards privatizing, consumption-oriented publics in search of affirmation and a sense of control over their daily lives. I develop an account of ideology formation that emphasizes ideology's rootedness in everyday material practice. (Abstract shortened by ProQuest.). |
