Chris Hedges: The Nature of Neoliberalism and its Consequences

Image by Isaías Campbell via Flickr

Dandelion Salad

with Chris Hedges

Originally on RT America on Nov 11, 2021

The Chris Hedges YouTube Channel on Jun 30, 2022

On the show, Chris Hedges discusses the nature of neoliberalism and its consequences with Professor Wendy Brown, Institute for Advanced Study, Princeton University.

Does the eruption of ethnonationalist movements defined by hyper patriotism, xenophobia, racism, religious chauvinism, and so-called traditional moral values signal the end of neoliberalism? Or are these protofascist movements the natural consequence of neoliberal policies that allowed corporations to corrupt and seize governing institutions and the press, impoverish the working class, and orchestrate the largest transference of wealth upwards in American history?

There is no doubt, as the political scientist Wendy Brown writes, that the constellation of principles, policies, practices, and forms of governing reason that may be gathered under the sign of neoliberalism has importantly constituted the catastrophic present, but, she argues, this was not neoliberalism’s intent, rather its Frankensteinian creation. By generating antidemocratic forms of state power above its natural consequence, she argues, was antidemocratic culture from below. The synergy between these two forces sees an increasingly undemocratic and antidemocratic citizenry ever more willing to validate an increasingly antidemocratic state.

Professor Wendy Brown teaches at the Institute of Advanced Study, Princeton University, and the author of In the Ruins of Neoliberalism: The Rise of Antidemocratic Politics in the West.

Watch the video.

From the archives:

Sheldon Wolin: Can Capitalism and Democracy Coexist? Parts 1-8, interviewed by Chris Hedges

America’s Instinctive Fascism Creeps On, by Paul Street

Capitalism Is Dying, But Don’t Expect The Patient To Accept The Prognosis, by Kenn Orphan

Michael Hudson: The Neoliberal Exploitation Under a Super-Imperialism Lens

Chris Hedges and Richard D. Wolff: Competing Systems of Power in America: Autocracy or Oligarchy

Chris Hedges: Undercurrents of American Fascism

Chris Hedges: Inverted Totalitarianism (With Wendy Brown)

The Democracy Lab, by Rivera Sun

Chris Hedges and David Harvey: The Ideology of Neoliberalism is a Con, Part 1

Chris Hedges: The Wreckage of Neoliberalism

Neoliberalism: The Economic Model: Origins, Theory, Definition (2005)