Speculative imagination, not neoliberal rationality, drives contemporary intimacies

Evidence

Entrepreneurial neoliberalism (as a dominant model that sanctions risk practices) no longer adequately explains the dynamics of our era’s speculative intimacies. Illouz associates this issue with the continuing influence of economization and its rationalizing language on our desires (creating, in her own words, “cold intimacies”), but I want to propose a significant modification to her account. It is our reinforced speculative imagination (rather than a neoliberal rationality) that pervades the accelerated, impatient, and transient nature of contemporary intimacies. — Aris Komporozos-Athanasiou, Speculative Communities, 233

Categorization

• DEFINE: Positions homo speculans against the entrepreneurial-neoliberal-risk model as the explanatory frame for intimacy.