(Neo)Liberal populism and Ireland’s ‘squeezed middle’

Race & Class ◽  
2020 ◽  
Vol 61 (4) ◽  
pp. 29-49
Author(s):  
Rosie R. Meade ◽  
Elizabeth Kiely
Keyword(s):  
Middle Class ◽  
Liberal Democracy ◽  
Welfare Recipients ◽  
The Political ◽  
Discursive Construction ◽  
Economic Relations ◽  
Parliamentary Debates ◽  
Mainstream Media ◽  
Media Narratives ◽  
The Unemployed

Acknowledging definitional problems associated with the concept of ‘populism’, this article shifts the analytic gaze away from actors or politics that are conventionally characterised as populist, on to an analysis of the doing of populism by those who typically evade the populist label. Tracing the discursive construction of the ‘squeezed middle’ in Irish mainstream media and parliamentary debates between January 2014 and March 2019, the authors analyse how this signifier was mobilised to fuel and foment ressentiment among middle-earning taxpayers. This article analyses how the discourses of the ‘squeezed middle’ functioned ideologically, as a form of anti-welfare populism, redirecting blame for middle-class ontological and material insecurities on to unemployed welfare recipients who were depicted as immoral, lazy and insulated from hardship. This article highlights how populism operates from the so-called moderate centres of liberal democracy and not exclusively from the political margins. Irish political and media narratives of the ‘squeezed middle’ are seen as part of a larger project whereby damaging myths about the unemployed are propagated in service of ideological class warfare; legitimising neoliberal austerity and normalising unequal economic relations.

The African National Congress' Economic and Social Policy Changes in South Africa (1994-2004): Another African Straightjacket Independence?

2004 ◽  
Vol 3 (3-4) ◽  
pp. 273-294
Author(s):  
Mueni wa Muiu
Keyword(s):  
South Africa ◽  
Middle Class ◽  
Liberal Democracy ◽  
African National Congress ◽  
Social Needs ◽  
Business Community ◽  
Political Rights ◽  
Economic Relations ◽  
Nationalist Discourse ◽  
Minority Interests

Abstract In this article I argue that Liberal democracy in South Africa accommodated and left unresolved the contradictions of South African capitalism and the ANC's multiracial nationalist discourse. More specifically, the delivery of equal political rights in the new democracy is premised on the acceptance of the unequal economic relations among different classes, gender and race. Second, the multi-racial and multi-ethnic middle class is threatened from above and below. Popular demands from below sometimes lead it to partially satisfy the people's economic and social demands. Pressure from economic interests and the business community limits the middle class' room for maneuver and forces it to make compromises at the expense of the people's interests, priorities and needs (especially economic ones). Apartheid's inequality can only be addressed by a radical program based on the majority's economic and social needs. Liberal democracy does not allow for radical changes because it privileges the market rather than peoples' needs. Consequently, the ANC cannot meet its overseers' (business, bilateral institutions, white minority) interests as well as transform the economy. These realities will continue to inform ANC's economic and social policies as it tries to transform South Africa for the foreseeable future.

Race, class and the deserving poor: Charities and the 1930s Depression in Java

2015 ◽  
Vol 46 (2) ◽  
pp. 205-226 ◽  
Author(s):  
John Ingleson
Keyword(s):  
Middle Class ◽  
Urban Poverty ◽  
Clear Distinction ◽  
The Political ◽  
Colonial State ◽  
The Poor ◽  
Deserving Poor ◽  
The Unemployed ◽  
Undeserving Poor

The 1930s Depression caused an enormous growth in urban poverty in colonial Java. Informal neighbourhood networks could no longer cope with the unemployed, the homeless and the destitute. Politically conscious Indonesians were convinced that the colonial state was concerned only with poverty among Europeans. They responded by creating new charities focused on the Indonesian lower classes. Many provided middle-class women with opportunities for leadership denied them in the political and labour movements. However, those who managed the charities had no concept of empowering the poor. In dispensing support they made a clear distinction between the deserving and the undeserving poor. Nevertheless their charitable work enabled thousands of Indonesians to survive the Depression years.

A new class for a new South Africa? The discursive construction of the ‘Black middle class’ in post-Apartheid media

2016 ◽  
Vol 17 (1) ◽  
pp. 105-121 ◽  
Author(s):  
Mehita Iqani
Keyword(s):  
South Africa ◽  
Middle Class ◽  
English Language ◽  
New South ◽  
Political Freedom ◽  
Black Middle Class ◽  
Discursive Construction ◽  
New Class ◽  
Media Narratives ◽  
Qualitative Discussion

This article presents a qualitative discussion about the ways in which English-language media in South Africa labelled the Black middle class ‘new’ during the first decade of political freedom (the 1990s). The empirical approach is discursive, drawing on a corpus of archival media material in which the ‘new Black middle class’ is discussed and debated. The article argues that three key discursive trends are evident therein: the first claiming the new Black middle class as full of socio-economic potential (but also as immature and not capable of delivering on that potential), the second attempting to rehistoricize the Black middle class and the third accusing the class of materialism, greed and being ‘sell-outs’. These discursive themes are discussed in relation to relevant scholarly literature about ‘new’ middle classes. This article concludes that media narratives about the newness of the Black middle class were the site of the symbolic contestation and discursive construction of the consuming class in South Africa.

William Graham Sumner and the Problem of Liberal Democracy

2010 ◽  
Vol 72 (4) ◽  
pp. 571-597 ◽  
Author(s):  
William F. Byrne
Keyword(s):  
Human Development ◽  
Liberal Democracy ◽  
Political Thought ◽  
The Political ◽  
Public Philosophy ◽  
Government Action ◽  
Economic Relations ◽  
Liberal Democratic ◽  
Incompatible Elements ◽  
Capitalist State

AbstractThis paper examines problems of the liberal democratic order through an analysis of the political thought of a neglected American thinker, William Graham Sumner. Sumner argues that the liberal order is inextricably linked to laissez-faire, and is under siege from the closely interrelated threats of socialism, plutocracy, imperialism, and the degeneration of democracy. He recognizes that the liberal-democratic capitalist state has significant deficiencies, including atomization, “cold” economic relations, and a loss of “poetry.” It also seems to depend upon values which are not readily propagated by liberalism. But efforts to address deficiencies through government action amount to attempts to intermix philosophically incompatible elements and serve to hasten the system's collapse. Sumner's work unwittingly suggests that the usual “Lockean” liberal model may be so flawed that a revised public philosophy, with new language and paradigms, is needed for the effective pursuit of his goals of freedom, dignity, and human development.

Neutral Masculinity: An Analysis of Parliamentary Debates on Austria’s Neutrality Law

2018 ◽  
Vol 22 (3) ◽  
pp. 444-464 ◽  
Author(s):  
Marion Löffler
Keyword(s):  
World War Ii ◽  
Political Parties ◽  
Political Identity ◽  
Transitional Period ◽  
The Political ◽  
Discursive Construction ◽  
World War ◽  
Allied Occupation ◽  
Parliamentary Debates ◽  
Masculinity Crisis

After World War II, postfascist Austria went through a transitional period of nation building. While the political parties (re)installed the democratic institutions and supported the idea of an independent Austria, they still disagreed on the nature of the “Austrian nation.” Moreover, the postwar period experienced a “crisis of masculinity” caused by the Allied occupation which signaled that Austria had lost the war. The official rhetoric, in contrast, claimed Austria’s status as a victim of Hitler’s aggression and hence, as a land not defeated, but liberated by the Allied forces. Self-victimization delegitimated both German nationalism and heroic masculinity. This article analyzes two debates on the neutrality act in the Austrian parliament in 1955, with a particular focus on the discursive construction of “neutral masculinity” as novel political identity and potential solution to the “masculinity crisis.” It deals with the question whether neutral masculinity contributed to a postheroic society and to “gender democracy.”

Three questions to political economy (An attempt of system introspection)

2018 ◽  
pp. 118-127 ◽  
Author(s):  
G. B. Kleiner
Keyword(s):  
Political Economy ◽  
Modern Society ◽  
Modern World ◽  
The Political ◽  
Economic Science ◽  
Linear Component ◽  
Capitalist System ◽  
Economic Space ◽  
Economic Relations ◽  
System Paradigm

The development of the system paradigm in economic science leads to the formulation of a number of important questions to the political economy as one of the basic directions of economic theory. In this article, on the basis of system introspection, three questions are considered. The first is the relevance of the class approach to the structuring of the socio-economic space; the second is the feasibility of revising the notion of property in the modern world; the third is the validity of the notion of changing formations as the sequence of “slave-owning system — feudal system — capitalist system”. It is shown that in modern society the system approach to the structuring of socio-economic space is more relevant than the class one. Today the classical notion of “property” does not reflect the diversity of production and economic relations in society and should be replaced by the notion of “system property”, which provides a significant expansion of the concepts of “subject of property” and “object of property”. The change of social formations along with the linear component has a more influential cyclic constituent and obeys the system-wide cyclic regularity that reflects the four-cycle sequence of the dominance of one of the subsystems of the macrosystem: project, object, environment and process.

From Globalisation to Revolution? The Porfirian Political Economy: An Essay on Issues and Interpretations

2009 ◽  
Vol 41 (2) ◽  
pp. 347-368 ◽  
Author(s):  
PAOLO RIGUZZI
Keyword(s):  
Political Economy ◽  
Mexican Revolution ◽  
Future Research ◽  
The Political ◽  
Economic Relations ◽  
Future Research Agenda ◽  
Current State ◽  
International Economic Relations ◽  
Economic Strategies ◽  
State Finance

AbstractThis essay evaluates the political economy of Mexico during the Porfirian period (1876–1911), with the aim of discussing advances in scholarship and presenting an outline of the elements for a future research agenda. To this end, the essay examines the current state of knowledge on four crucial aspects of the Mexican economy: growth and its dimensions; the state, finance and economic strategies; the construction and functioning of the internal market; and the international economic relations of Mexico during the first period of globalisation. In particular, it assesses the arguments that link features of Porfirian economic organisation with the outbreak of the Mexican Revolution in 1910.

Political corruption in Zimbabwe: News media, audiences and deliberative democracy

2021 ◽  
pp. 174165902110224
Author(s):  
Mthokozisi Phathisani Ndhlovu ◽  
Phillip Santos
Keyword(s):  
Deliberative Democracy ◽  
News Media ◽  
Political Action ◽  
Qualitative Content Analysis ◽  
Political Corruption ◽  
Political Elite ◽  
The Political ◽  
Media Audiences ◽  
Mainstream Media ◽  
Ruling Party

Even though corruption by politicians and in politics is widespread worldwide, it is more pronounced in developing countries, such as Zimbabwe, where members of the political elite overtly abuse power for personal accumulation of wealth. Ideally, the news media, as watchdogs, are expected to investigate and report such abuses of power. However, previous studies in Zimbabwe highlight the news media’s polarised and normative inefficacies. Informed by the theoretical notion of deliberative democracy developed via Habermas and Dahlgren’s work and Hall’s Encoding, Decoding Model, this article uses qualitative content analysis to examine how online readers of Zimbabwe’s two leading daily publications, The Herald and NewsDay, interpreted and evaluated allegations of corruption leveled against ministers and deputy ministers during the height of factionalism in the ruling party (ZANU PF). The article argues that interaction between mainstream media and their audiences online shows the latter’s resourcefulness and, at least, discursive agency in their engagement with narratives about political corruption, itself an imperative premise for future political action.

Working Less, Not More in a Workfare Programme: Group Solidarity, Informal Norms and Alternative Value Systems Amongst Activated Participants

2021 ◽  
pp. 1-17
Author(s):  
LASSE SCHMIDT HANSEN ◽  
MATHIAS HERUP NIELSEN
Keyword(s):  
Lived Experiences ◽  
Political Rhetoric ◽  
Welfare Recipients ◽  
Value Systems ◽  
The Political ◽  
Modus Operandi ◽  
Apparent Paradox ◽  
Group Solidarity ◽  
Manual Labour ◽  
Informal Regulation

Abstract This article uses extensive ethnographic methods to explore the lived reality of a Danish workfare programme. The programme requires social assistance recipients to perform manual labour for their benefits at municipal work sites. The contrast between the political rhetoric that justifies the workfare programme and the lived reality of it is striking. While the programme is justified as a means to put the passive unemployed to work, there is a norm of working less, not more at the site. The participants spend most of their time waiting or conducting seemingly meaningless work assignments. However, over time, the majority of the participants begin to embrace this modus operandi at the site. This article answers this apparent paradox by turning to concepts from the anthropology of industrial work. Such concepts allow us to analyse how camaraderie exists amongst participants as well as work supervisors at the site. Particularly, the camaraderie is based on group solidarity, an informal regulation of work efficiency and an alternative system of value. Hereby, the article adds to previous findings on the ‘lived experiences’ of welfare recipients.

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