Mainstream financialization critique sees homo politicus vanquished by an all-consuming homo economicus

Evidence

This greatly influential portrayal—the neoliberal iteration of homo economicus—is rooted in two (not necessarily compatible) theoretical traditions: on one hand, the Aristotelian distinction between “the political” and “the economic,” which underpins much of Hannah Arendt’s political theory; on the other hand, Foucault’s influential analysis of governmentality and of the biopolitically controlled, neoliberal economic subject, which has influenced some of the most widely cited critiques of financialization. For Brown, under late neoliberalism this becomes a full-blown conflict between the modern homo economicus and homo politicus, with the latter having been “vanquished” by the former. Above all, the alleged growing dominance of neoliberalism’s economic rationality reflects a change in the ways capitalism derives and renews what Beckert (2020) defines as its “promissory legitimacy”: the perceived (that is, imagined) credibility of promises of the future through which political authority gains support. To put it plainly: according to these critiques, the modern homo politicus has not only been ensnared by the homo economicus, but it has also “bought into” the imagined futures promised by neoliberal reason. — Aris Komporozos-Athanasiou, Speculative Communities, 73

Categorization

• DEFINE: Introduces Beckert’s ‘promissory legitimacy’ — imagined credibility of future promises — a concept central to understanding speculative voting under uncertainty.
• XREF: Relevant to whether Komporozos-Athanasiou’s ‘counter-speculations’ chapter claims more than this Brown/Foucault target allows — the critical juncture the reader wants to test. — connects to: Financialization establishes ideological dominance of individual profit over collective interests — Aris Komporozos-Athanasiou, Speculative Communities: Living with…, 109; Contemporary homo oeconomicus has become financialized human capital — Wendy Brown, Undoing the Demos: Neoliberalism’s…, 52; Homo speculans replaces homo economicus as contemporary capitalism’s characteristic subject — Aris Komporozos-Athanasiou, Speculative Communities: Living With…, 357 (+1 more)
• yield-rescued: below the book’s yield-target cutoff, included anyway for connecting to: Financialization establishes ideological dominance of individual profit over collective interests — Aris Komporozos-Athanasiou, Speculative Communities: Living with…, 109; Contemporary homo oeconomicus has become financialized human capital — Wendy Brown, Undoing the Demos: Neoliberalism’s…, 52; Homo speculans replaces homo economicus as contemporary capitalism’s characteristic subject — Aris Komporozos-Athanasiou, Speculative Communities: Living With…, 357 (+1 more)

Broader Connections

• Financialization drives a nonlinear shift from rational to imaginative economic man #complicates (0.82) — Aris Komporozos-Athanasiou, Speculative Communities, 26
• Homo speculans replaces homo economicus as contemporary capitalism’s characteristic subject #complicates (0.78) — Aris Komporozos-Athanasiou, Speculative Communities, 357