Neoliberalism survived by co-opting multiculturalism into marketable identity commodities

Evidence

Will Kymlicka suggests a mutually transformative relationship between neoliberalism and the multicultural contexts in which it operates, what he calls “a dense field of social relationships” that condition neoliberalism’s impact. He records how multiculturalism began with the increasing incorporation of minority rights by liberal states in the West, enshrining recognition of difference within a system where state regulation and intervention were recognized tools used to curb the effects of markets’ cyclical flux. With the rise of neoliberalism in the 1980s, multiculturalism was initially seen as “unjustified interference in the market in response to ‘special interests,’ ” a sort of extension of the welfare system neoliberals opposed and a misuse of government funds. Yet the survival of multiculturalism in the teeth of this attack has to do less with its own politically compromised nature than with a new attitude among neoliberals, who gradually came to see the market potential of multiculturalism. If interventionist social liberalism could use multiculturalism as a way to better integrate minorities into nations, surely it was possible to use the same identitarian impulses to integrate them into global markets. Thus, according to Kymlicka, the aim became to draw on the unique, saleable characteristics of minorities to create commodities for markets and to extend the reach of such markets using the cultural knowledge minorities could bring to the table. In short, the idea was to create “not a tolerant national citizen who is concerned for the disadvantaged in her own society, but a cosmopolitan market actor who can compete effectively across state boundaries.” Leonie Sandercock explains his kind of business-friendly multiculturalism, sometimes known as “commercial multiculturalism,” as assuming “that if the diversity of individuals from different communities is recognized in the marketplace, then the problems of cultural difference will be dissolved through private consumption, without any need for a redistribution of power and resources.” — Peter Morey, Islamophobia and the Novel, 185

Categorization

• XREF: Directly relevant to how The Reluctant Fundamentalist and Home Boy treat the protagonist’s marketable Muslim/immigrant identity — Changez is precisely a ‘cosmopolitan market actor’ until his disillusionment. — connects to: Cultural alienation became marketable and co-opted rather than disruptive — Martin Jay, The Dialectical Imagination: A History…, 71; Web 2.0 culture promotes a neoliberal identity that is constructible and improvable. — Alice E. Marwick, Status Update: Celebrity, Publicity,…, 495; Neoliberalism’s durability rests on fusing the economic with the cultural — Philip Mirowski, Never Let a Serious Crisis Go to Waste, 298 (+4 more)
• SEED: Could ground an essay claiming the ‘good immigrant’ narrative in fiction is commercial multiculturalism’s literary arm — minority difference packaged as marketable testimony.