Chủ nghĩa Tư bản Muộn và Mệnh lệnh Chân thực: Quản trị Sự Chân thực trong Kỷ nguyên Tân tự do

A University of Sussex PhD thesis Available online via Sussex Research Online: http://sro.uk/ This thesis is protected by copyright which belongs to the author. This thesis cannot be reproduced or quoted extensively from without first obtaining permission in writing from the Author The content must not be changed in any way or sold commercially in any format or medium without the formal permission of the Author When referring to this work, full bibliographic details including the author, title, awarding institution and date of the thesis must be given Please visit Sussex Research Online for more information and further details Late Capitalism and the Imperative of Authenticity: The Governance of Authenticity in the Neoliberal Era Romanos Lyritsas DPhil candidate in Social & Political Thought Department of Philosophy School of History, Art History and Philosophy University of Sussex i Declaration I hereby declare that this thesis has not been previously submitted, whether in the same or different form, to this of any other University for a degree. Signature: i ii Abstract Along with the birth of the modern subject the demand for the authenticity of the self emerges. Until a certain point in its history, capitalism has been seen as a homogenizing system that suppresses diversity and the authentic core of the self; consequently, until that point, the demand for authenticity, despite its co-emergence with capitalism, had a radical anticapitalistic aspect.

In contrast today, late capitalist societies integrate rather than suppress diversity and value pluralism; rather than drive for homogeneity they thrive on heterogeneity. In contrast to previous stages of capitalism, late capitalist societies not only have embraced the idea of authenticity, but they have been increasing its demand. The aim of this thesis is to examine the redefinition of the relationship between capitalism and authenticity. The analysis aims at moving beyond the opposition between the fake and the authentic, to examine the ways that the contemporary self is shaped by the conditions of late capitalism and neoliberal government.

Such an analysis requires the acknowledgement of the biopolitical nature of capitalism and its immanent relationship with the production of subjectivity. The first chapter of the thesis critically reviews attempts in recent social theory that examine the relationship of late capitalism with authenticity. The second chapter examines the economic and power relations that defined the subject in industrial capitalism. It is shown that the individual was subjected to the homogenizing forces of disciplinary technologies of power and liberal forms of government.

The third chapter examines the different ways that conformity is achieved as a result of neoliberal governmentality and the new modes of surveillance that underpin it. The fourth chapter deals with the characteristics of the entrepreneurial subject and the new subjective form that emerges in the conditions established by late capitalism and neoliberal government. It is argued that the entrepreneurial self is a self-responsible, autonomous subject who has to construct their life-project through calculated choices in all aspects of their life. The last chapter claims that the entrepreneurial self, in addition to all the other responsibilities, is weighted with the imperative to be authentic, with the responsibility to construct their own authentic identity.

It is argued that the imposition of the obligation to “be yourself” has negative consequences for the subject but also for our common, political life. Key Words: Late capitalism, Authenticity, Liberalism, Neoliberalism, Biopower, Governmentality, the Entrepreneurial Self ii iii Acknowledgements Firstly I would like to thank my two supervisors, Prof Gerard Delanty and Prof Darrow Schecter for their academic support throughout the development of this thesis. I would also like to thank all the administrative staff at the Faculty of the Department of Philosophy School of History, Art History and Philosophy of the University of Sussex, who have all been very helpful during my studies. I would also like to thank all my friends for contributing directly or indirectly to the development of this thesis.

Last but not the least, I would like to thank my family who supported me throughout my studies and my life in general. iii iv Table of Contents Acknowledgements Introduction: Authenticity and Capitalism 7 Enlightenment: Authenticity and politics……….11 Capitalism and Alienation…………………………………………………………….13 Mass culture: The Frankfurt School ………………………………………………….15 Authenticity as simulacrum…………………………………………………………….17 Late capitalism and authenticity: A new relationship but an old understanding……….19 Methods, aims and the contribution of this thesis…………………………………….23 Chapter 1: Late Capitalism and Authenticity - perspectives in social theory 26 The postmodern condition: Authenticity or the cultural logic of late capitalism…. ……29 The new spirit of capitalism: Justification through authenticity……………………….37 Immaterial production and authenticity…………………………………………….52 Chapter 2: Capitalism and the Industrial Subject 54 Capitalism, power, and the subject……………………………………………………. 56 Liberalism as “the general framework of biopower” ………………………………….61 The birth of the social: A new field for political intervention ………………………….70 Disciplinary and social subjection…………………………………………………….75 Conclusion…………………………………………………………………………… 78 Chapter 3: Neoliberalism and the Surveillance of Authenticity 79 Neoliberal government and control………………………………………………….81 Late capitalism and the surveillance-industrial complex……………………………….

93 iv v The moral neutrality of the new transparency…………………………………………. 99 The periopticity of the institutional web……………………………………………….106 Chapter 4: The Entrepreneurial Self: Life as a Responsibility 108 The self as human capital…………………………………………………………….109 The construction of the entrepreneurial worker………………………………………113 The mobilization of the active consumer……………………………………………. 118 Financial economy and the indebted entrepreneur……………………………………120 Healthcare and self-care ……… …………………………………………………….123 Risk management as a mode of life: the resilient subject………………………………128 Conclusion……………………………………………………………………………130 Chapter 5: The Imperative of Authenticity 132 The cultural sphere as field of private freedom and self-actualization……………. 134 Branding yourself authentic………………………………………………………….

140 Authenticity through consumption…………………………………………………. 145 The malaises of authenticity………………………………………………………….156 Conclusion: Capitalism wants you to be yourself –Reclaiming the demand for authenticity 158 Bibliography 164 v vi vi 7 INTRODUCTION: CAPITALISM AND AUTHENTICITY In recent times the ideal of authenticity has come to dominate the economic, political, and cultural discourses of Western societies. Authenticity is promoted in business and managerial handbooks, lifestyle magazines, and self-help books. It is presented as a political value and an electoral asset.

The authenticity of the self has become a goal to be striven for, a path to happiness, a social and professional skill, and a healing power. Today, anything other than “being yourself” seems inappropriate. The imperative of authenticity has become all powerful (Gilmore, and Pine, 2007; Filed, 2007; George and Bennis, 2008; Robbin, 2009; Anastaze, 2015; Dillard, 2015; Joseph, 2016; Tacker, 2016).1 But what do we really mean by the term “authenticity”? According to the Oxford English Dictionary, the word authenticity signifies the genuineness or originality of an object or a subject: for something or someone to be authentic means it being “in accordance with fact”, it “being true in substance”, or it “being what it professes to be in origin or authorship; being genuine” (OED, emphases mine). The meaning of the term is more complicated than it might appear at first.

Its complexity lies in those italicized words: “in accordance with” and “professes”. Although authenticity is understood as an integral quality of an object or a person, this quality must be disclosed externally in order for said object or subject to be considered authentic. Something or someone is qualified as authentic when what it, or she, professes to be is in accordance with its, or her, integral characteristics. Thus, authenticity is by definition an evaluative concept that measures the degree of consistency between the supposedly integral characteristics of an object or a subject and that which is disclosed on the outside (for authenticity as an evaluative term see Vannini and Williams, 2016: 3).

When human beings are deemed “authentic”, the notion of authenticity acquires another important characteristic. In order to be authentic (or inauthentic), a person must profess to be a certain way or possess a certain characteristic. A person is considered to be authentic when she acts in accordance with her true character, thoughts, emotions, or beliefs, when how she acts or expresses herself measures up to how she really is. In this sense, the notion of authenticity is performative.

This means that authenticity requires the subject to construct and maintain her authenticity through verbal or non-verbal acts of 1 These are just some of the many ways in which mainstream publications have uncritically reproduced the imperative of authenticity. Such publications celebrate authenticity as a quality that benefits all aspects of a person’s life, promising everything from professional success to personal happiness.2 Lastly, when the concept is attributed to human beings, authenticity acquires an ethical character. In his provocative The Ethics of Authenticity (1991), and before that in his Sources of the Self (1989), Charles Taylor discusses the ethical character of the notion of authenticity. Taylor suggests that the concept of authenticity has been central to the construction of the modern self, and he argues against critics who condemn the concept of authenticity as egocentric or as lacking any ethical orientation.

Taylor emphasizes that, although the ethics of authenticity do signify an inward turn on the part of the modern subject, authenticity has always also been connected with the community or society to which someone belongs: “authenticity is not the enemy of demands that emanate from beyond the self; it presupposes such demands” (Taylor 1991: 41). Taylor’s statement can be better understood when seen in the light of a Foucauldian understanding of ethics. In his later work, after his so-called “ethical turn”, Foucault moves away from analysing the subject simply as constituted by discursive practices and power relations and explores the sense in which the modern subject is a self-constituted moral agent as well as a self subjected to power–knowledge apparatuses.3 For Foucault, morality consists of three components: the moral codes, the morality of behaviours, and ethics. Moral codes are those values and rules of action laid down for individuals by “prescriptive agencies” such as the family and educational or religious institutions.

The morality of behaviours refers to the actions and behaviours of individuals in relation to the prescribed moral codes set by those agencies. Finally, ethics refers to the relationship one develops to oneself in order to constitute oneself as an ethical subject within a certain environment of prescribed values and rules.4 For this to be achieved, the subject engages in certain “practices of the self” through which the self is constructed in a way that serves the subject’s moral goals (Foucault, 1985: 25–32). Foucault thus offers a relational 2 I am referring to the notion of performativity as developed by Judith Butler. For this see Butler (1990; 2006).

For authenticity as a performative concept see Banet-Weiser (2012: 60). 3 In several interviews later in his life, Foucault admits that in his earlier work he was overly insistent on the idea of the constitution of the subject by discursive practices and power technologies (i. However, he also suggests that the notion of the self-constitution of the subject is present in his earlier work (Foucault, 2000b: 262) With these remarks, Foucault effectively argues against an understanding of his thought as divided between his earlier work and his so-called “ethical turn”. 4 According to Foucault this relationship has four aspects: the ethical substance, which is the way that individuals constitute a certain part of themselves as the material of their moral conduct; the mode of subjection, the way that individuals establish their relationship with the prescribed moral codes; the ethical work, that is, the self-forming activity that one performs in order to transform oneself into an ethical subject; and finally the telos, the mode of being that one aims to develop as an ethical subject (Foucault, 1995: 26, 27, 28; see also Davidson, 2005: 126).

8 9 understanding of morality that emphasizes the relationship between power institutions and moral codes, between the subject and those codes, and between the subject and herself (Foucault, 1985: 28). On this view, the subject is understood as the point at which discursive practices and power relations merge with ethics.