Neoliberal urban governance produces racially differentiated poverty through market mechanisms
Evidence
But Grenfell was not only a private catastrophe; it was also a deeply political, public one. Not only does it tell a contemporary ‘tale of two cities’, as Corbyn put it, referring to the mansions jutting up alongside neglected social-housing towers in the highly unequal borough; it also reveals the racialisation of poverty and vulnerability in a neoliberal period in which racial segmentation occurs as much through the impersonal, ‘colour-blind’ operation of the market as through direct racial discrimination. The fire was not only a result of what the Grenfell Action Group had previously warned was the dangerous ‘ineptitude and incompetence’ of the council, which had failed to install a sprinkler system or repair blocked fire-exits. The council’s decision to clad the building’s façade to improve its appearance when viewed from wealthy surrounding areas – and then to cut costs by opting for cheap, flammable cladding – also played a role, as did the privatisation of fire-safety assessments and cuts to the fire service. Grenfell embodied a ‘neoliberal urbanism’ characterised by the downgrading of social housing, the flouting of regulations, and the outsourcing of renovations to the lowest bidder, in a context of gentrification and the erosion of the supply of social housing. — Jessica Whyte, The Morals of the Market, 5
Categorization
- XREF: Racialisation through ‘colour-blind’ market operations connects to the earlier claim that slavery’s juridical racism was production-driven, and to systemic racism arguments. — connects to: Neoliberalism functioned as a racial regime in the United States — Michael Omi, Howard Winant, Racial Formation in the United States, 202; Race functions as a core structuring technology of neoliberal state formation — David Theo Goldberg, The Threat of Race: Reflections on…, 1770; Colorblind racial ideology and neoliberalism are mutually dependent political projects — Michael Omi, Howard Winant, Racial Formation in the United States, 31 (+12 more)
Broader Connections
- Race functions as a core structuring technology of neoliberal state formation
#expands(0.85) — David Theo Goldberg, The Threat of Race, 1770 - Neoliberal globalization privatizes institutional racisms stripped of explicit labels
#expands(0.85) - Neoliberalism functioned as a racial regime in the United States
#expands(0.82) — Michael Omi, Howard Winant, Racial Formation in the United States, 202 - Race persists under neoliberalism by mutating into coded private arrangements
#expands(0.82) — David Theo Goldberg, The Threat of Race, 1845 - Neoliberalism shifts racial discrimination into the privatized sphere where the state cannot intervene
#expands(0.82) - Racialized structures distribute resources and access by race
#expands(0.80) — David Theo Goldberg, John Solomos, A Companion to Racial and Ethnic Studies, 1828 - Private racial exclusions fall outside state reach under neoliberalism
#expands(0.80) — David Theo Goldberg, The Threat of Race, 1768 - Neoliberalism displaces racial markers onto marketable and consumable identity conditions.
#expands(0.80) — David Theo Goldberg, The Threat of Race, 1606 - Neoliberalism survived by commodifying minority difference rather than opposing it
#expands(0.80) — Peter Morey, Islamophobia and the Novel, 185 - Colorblind racial ideology and neoliberalism are mutually dependent political projects
#corroborates(0.78) — Michael Omi, Howard Winant, Racial Formation in the United States, 31 - Racial neoliberalism reconciles personal preference with history-shaped racial constraint
#corroborates(0.78) — David Theo Goldberg, The Threat of Race, 1803 - Neoliberalism displaces race into market-mediated commodified self-presentation
#expands(0.78) - Neoliberal ‘free choice’ masks racially marked constraints on mobility
#corroborates(0.78) - Colorblindness and neoliberalism rose together as mutually reinforcing hegemonies
#corroborates(0.75) — Michael Omi, Howard Winant, Racial Formation in the United States, 210