art-e-conomy _ reader - marko stamenkovic

Jim McGUIGAN
Neo-liberalism, Culture and Policy
Introduction
We live in an age of neo-liberal globalisation. This is a profoundly hegemonic
condition, though not without contradictions and resistances. What are the relations
between a global process of neo-liberalisation and culture in both general and particular
senses? Is it even feasible to pose such a wide-ranging question at all in a complex
and baffling world? In what follows I will make some preliminary observations that do
not by any means exhaustively cover the various aspects of neo-liberalism, culture
and policy but are intended to open up debate.
Neo-Liberal Globalisation
How should we characterise and name the present condition? There is no shortage of
candidates, such as ‘the global age’, ‘the information age’, not to mention the variants
of ‘modernity’ and ‘postmodernity’. Recently, the term ‘neo-liberal globalisation’ has
been used increasingly by critics and activists. This may be an offputting nomination
for many since it seems to imply a reduction to political economy and the dreaded
economic determinism of classical Marxism. However, the emphasis on neo-liberal
globalisation does have the distinct virtue of avoiding the kind of cultural reductionism
that is so prevalent in social analysis today.
Neo-liberalism refers to the extraordinary ‘revival of doctrines of the free market’
(Gamble, 2001: 127) over the past thirty years. The free-market revival coincided
with the crisis of Fordist capitalism during the 1970s and the subsequent collapse
of soviet communism. Transferring manufacture from richer to poorer countries,
reducing the social wage, expanding global business and speeding up communications,
all contributed to the victory of market ideology and practice in the recent period.
Incidentally, the new international division of labour generally encompasses a new
international division of cultural labour whereby capital ruthlessly seeks out cheap
sources of production for making films and the like (Miller et al, 2001). The IMF
(International Monetary Fund), the World Bank and the WTO (World Trade Organisation)
all subscribe to neo-liberal doctrines of ‘free trade’, privatisation and deregulation.
And, from a cultural policy point of view, the operations of GATS (General Agreement
on Trade in Services) and TRIPS (Trade- Related Intellectual Property Rights) are of
cardinal importance.
It is vital to appreciate the historicity of neo-liberalism and to remember that not
long ago such rabid capitalism was thought to be untenable both economically and
with regard to social cohesion across the political spectrum from left to right. As well
as changing structural conditions in global economy and governance, neo-liberalism
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