Neoliberal governance and its structures, and dispositifs, are at the core of contemporary debates in the human sciences. David Harvey (2006) considers neoliberalism a theory that places individual freedom as the final goal of all civilisations. Private property rights, free markets and liberal democracy are the means through which individual freedom is best protected and society flourishes, according to neo-liberal views. The primary role of the state is to enforce property rights, while market forces govern the economy. Neo-liberal ideas have shaped global and national policy for over three decades, introducing the primacy of private property and market rationality in all range of public life from education to healthcare, from land governance to environmental protection. Workers' rights in the global North as well as in the South are devalued in favour of individual responsibility.

Argument

Neoliberal governance and its structures, and dispositifs, are at the core of contemporary debates in the human sciences. David Harvey (2006) considers neoliberalism a theory that places individual freedom as the final goal of all civilisations. Private property rights, free markets and liberal democracy are the means through which individual freedom is best protected and society flourishes, according to neo-liberal views. The primary role of the state is to enforce property rights, while market forces govern the economy. Neo-liberal ideas have shaped global and national policy for over three decades, introducing the primacy of private property and market rationality in all range of public life from education to healthcare, from land governance to environmental protection. Workers' rights in the global North as well as in the South are devalued in favour of individual responsibility. In agricultural dependent countries, the rural poor find themselves struggling with the commodification of land and of the larger environment. Because of their pervasiveness in social life, neo-liberal ideas shape institutions as well as individuals. If the production of subjectivity is also the result of social relations, then what kinds of subjectivities does neo-liberalism produce? How do individual and collective subjects participate or challenge neo-liberal governance, and what forms of social identities does this engagement engender? Through the effort of asking this question, the seminar aims to stimulate a debate on the structures of neo-liberalism and its implementing devices while analyzing patterns of struggle and adherence, and the subjectivities they produce in the global North as well as in the South.

The seminar will cross three thematic areas:

International mobility and migration

This panel aims at exploring the kind of subjectivities that new laws, borders, discourses and practices of mobility produce. Globalization and the acceleration of economic exchange have deeply affected the movement of humans, and pose new sets of challenges to migrants, citizens and activists. In the global North, the mobility of poor migrant workers is tightly regulated and often punished, while the mobility of the citizens of the union is often actively promoted through a series of devices, such as student exchange programs and international traineeships (both low and high pay). Neo-liberal governance also touches migration in other ways, as the opening of borders to capital facilitates the circulation of subjects inserted in international dynamics of exchange though different forms of mobility and circulation.

Environment, food and agriculture

This panel explores the production of subjectivities and collective identities engendered by people's interaction with the commodification of land, natural resources, and the management of agricultural and natural landscapes. In the wake of a global climate crisis, the neo-liberal response to the environmental change has so far further expanded the processes of commodification. From the rise of the global market for carbon credits to the patenting of vegetal life, from market-oriented land reform to the liberalization of primary commodity markets, neo-liberal capitalism has changed the way global nature is conceived and socially produced (Moore 2015). As a consequence, neo-liberalism has informed the work of small producers around the globe, and it has radically changed the way humans interact with the rest of nature.

Welfare, governance and service delivery

The panel explores the interactions between the production of individual, collective and political subjectivities with neoliberal policies pushing for good governance, transparency and participatory agendas. Although the state seems to be making a timid resurgence as social movements challenge free-market ideology, neo-liberal policies have globally shaped the face of the state machinery. Policy makers and international agencies such as the World Bank and the IMF have long argued for state reform, decentralization, transparency and liberal democracy. At the same time, the delivery of public goods is seen at its best when in the hands of private actors or managed through 'participatory' mechanisms relying on civil society actors. However, scholarly critics have long debated the neoliberal governance vocabulary, questioning issues of democracy and participation and hiding relations of power and inequality in local contexts (Petras 1999).

Submission guidelines

The seminar is open to doctoral students and junior researchers in the social sciences.

Participants will be asked to discuss their topic during a 20 minute presentation.

Applicants should fill in the following form (attached) (including a 300 words abstract) and send in PDF format to cecile.giraud@uclouvain.be

by the 05/02/2016.

Results will be communicated to participants by the 10/02/2016.

The seminar will be held in English and French. Application can be written either in French or in English.

The scientific committee encourages participants to circulate full draft articles of their presentation for possible publication purposes.

Scientific committee

• An Ansoms – UCL/DVLP
• Matthieu de Nanteuil - UCL/CRIDIS
• Giuseppe Cioffo - UCL/DVLP
• Aymar Nyenyezi - UCL/DVLP
• Cécile Giraud - UCL/DVLP