Instructor: W. Brown
In this course we will first analyze Marx’s account of capitalism in Capital and then turn to critical theoretical accounts of neoliberalism, concentrating on Foucault’s account in The Birth of Biopolitics. Our work will have two foci: 1) what is and isn’t distinctive about neoliberalism as a theory, description or modality of capitalism, 2) what is gained and lost in moving between Marx and Foucault.
Thus we will reflect on epistemological and ontological matters in materialism, political rationality, and normative reason, and also on whether central concepts in Marx’s critical theory-labor power, commodities, exchange value, fetishism, contradiction, etc.-remain relevant to neoliberal formations. This course is not an introduction to Marx or neoliberalism. It presumes knowledge of both, even as we will attempt to defamiliarize and rethink both.
Enrollment limit is 15 and the instructor’s permission is required.
Note: To apply, send no more than a page on your relevant academic background and your interest in the course to wlbrown@berkeley.edu
