Foucault, Public Finance, and Neoliberal Governmentality: A Critical Sociological Analysis

Year 2018, Volume: 25 Issue: 3, 677 - 694, 28.12.2018

Ceyhun Gürkan

https://doi.org/10.18657/yonveek.449581

Cited By: 2

Abstract

Over the past three decades, fiscal sociology has increasingly gained traction among scholars in the fields of public finance, sociology, and politics as the market economies plunged into
recession periodically. With the 2008 global crisis, things have turned worse not only for economies but also for the broader social systems under the severe problems of the rising inequalities as a worrisome trend between and within countries. Fiscal sociology scholarship is seen as a promising research program by those who seek to understand complex and interrelated causes, effects and consecutive developments of the crisis. This paper aims to make a contribution to the critical fiscal sociological approach. To that aim, French philosopher and historian Michel Foucault and contemporary governmentality literature after Foucault will be reviewed. The paper constructs a framework for a broader sociological understanding of the current situation and crisis of public finance in theory and practice. Accordingly, public finance in the neoliberal context is described as a constructive governmental technology that carves out state policies and a type of public organization at the macro level and conducts the behaviors of individuals at the micro level of everyday life in a way to spread the market logic to the fiscal and, in turn, non-economic social domains. 

Keywords

Foucault, Governmentality, Neoliberalism, Public Finance, Financialization, Fiscal Sociology

Foucault, Kamu Maliyesi ve Neoliberal Yönetimsellik: Eleştirel Sosyolojik Bir Analiz

Abstract

Piyasa ekonomileri aralıklı olarak durgunluğa girdikçe mali sosyoloji kamu maliyesi, sosyoloji ve siyaset bilimi alanlarında çalışanların gözünde son otuz yılda gittikçe kabul görmeye
başladı. 2008 küresel krizi ile birlikte, sadece ekonomiler için değil, aynı zamanda ülkeler arasında ve ülkelerin kendi içinde endişe verici bir eğilim olarak yükselen eşitsizliklerin ağır problemleri altında daha geniş planda toplumsal sistemler için de işler kötüleşti. Mali sosyoloji bilimsel alanı krizin karmaşık ve iç içe geçmiş nedenlerini, etkilerini ve ardıl gelişmelerini anlamaya çalışanlar tarafından potansiyeli yüksek bir araştırma programı olarak görülmektedir. Bu makale eleştirel mali sosyolojik yaklaşıma katkı sağlamayı amaçlamaktadır. Bu amaç doğrultusunda Fransız filozof ve tarihçi Michel Foucault ve ondan sonra gelişen yönetimsellik yazını gözden geçirilecektir. Çalışma kamu maliyesinin güncel durumunu ve krizini teoride ve pratikte daha geniş bir sosyolojik anlayış içinde kavrayabilen bir çerçeve çıkarmaktadır. Buna göre, neoliberal bağlamda kamu maliyesi makro düzeyde devlet politikalarını ve belirli bir kamusal örgütlenme tarzını biçimlendiren ve gündelik yaşamın mikro düzeyinde bireylerin davranışlarını yöneten, bunu piyasa mantığını mali ve oradan ekonomik olmayan sosyal alanlara yayacak biçimde gerçekleştiren inşa edici bir yönetimsel teknoloji olarak tanımlanmaktır. 

Keywords

Foucault, Yönetimsellik, Neoliberalizm, Kamu Maliyesi, Finansallaşma, Mali Sosyoloji

References

• Agamben, G. (2013). For a Theory of Destituent Power. Public Lecture in Athens, Invitation and Organization by Nicos Poulantzas Institute and SYRIZA Youth.http://www.chronosmag.eu/index.php/g-agamben-for-a-theory-of-destituent-power.html. Accessed 18/02/2018.
• Brown, W. (2015). Undoing the Demos: Neoliberalism’s Stealth Revolution. New York: Zone Books.
• Burchell, G. (1996). Liberal Government and Techniques of the Self. P. Miller and N. Rose (Eds.), Foucault and Political Reason: Liberalism, Neo-liberalism, and Rationalities of Government (p. 19-36). Chicago: University of Chicago Press.
• Collier, S. J. (2007). Budgets and Biopolitics. A. Ong and S. J. Collier (Eds.), Global Assemblages: Technology, Politics, and Ethics as Anthropological Problems (p. 373-390). Oxford: Blackwell Publishing Ltd.
• Collier, S. J. (2011). Post-Soviet Social: Neoliberalism, Social Modernity, Biopolitics. Princeton: Princeton University Press.
• Dardot, P. and Laval, C. (2014). The New Way of the World: On Neoliberal Society. G. Elliott (Trans). London&New York: Verso.
• Foucault, M. (1978). The History of Sexuality, Vol. 1. R. Hurley (Trans.). New York: Pantheon Books.
• Foucault, M. (1995). Discipline and Punish: The Birth of the Prison. A. Sheridan (Trans.). New York: Vintage Books.
• Foucault, M. (1997). Technologies of the Self. P. Rabinow (Ed.), The Essential Works of Foucault I, 1954-1984: Ethics: Subjectivity and Truth (p. 223-251). New York: The New Press.
• Foucault, M. (2001a). Interview with Michel Foucault. J. F. Faubion (Ed.), The Essential Works of Foucault III, 1954-1984: Power (p. 239-297). London: Allen Lane.
• Foucault, M. (2001b). The Subject and Power. J. F. Faubion (Ed.), The Essential Works of Foucault III, 1954-1984: Power (p. 326-348). London: Allen Lane.
• Foucault, M. (2001c). Truth and Juridical Forms. J. F. Faubion (Ed.), The Essential Works of Foucault III, 1954-1984: Power (1-89). London: Allen Lane.
• Foucault, M. (2001d). Omnes et Singulatim: Toward a Critique of Political Reason. J. F. Faubion (ed.), The Essential Works of Foucault III, 1954-1984: Power (298-325). London: Allen Lane.
• Foucault, M. (2003). Society Must be Defended, Lectures at the Collège de France 1975-1976. M. Bertani and A. Fontana (Eds.), D. Macey (Trans.). New York: Picador.
• Foucault, M. (2007). Security, Territory, Population, Lectures at the Collège de France 1977-1978. M. Senellart (Ed.), G. Burchell (Trans.). New York: Palgrave Macmillan.
• Foucault, M. (2008), The Birth of Biopolitics, Lectures at the Collège de France 1978-1979. M. Senellart (Ed.), G. Burchell (Trans.). New York: Palgrave Macmillan.
• Foucault, M. (2010). The Government of Self and Others, Lectures at the Collège de France 1982-1983. F. Gros (Ed.), G. Burchell (Trans.). New York: Palgrave Macmillan.
• Goldscheid, R. (1958). A Sociological Approach to Problems of Public Finance. R. Musgrave and A. T. Peacock (Eds.), E. Henderson (Trans.), Classics in the Theory of Public Finance (p. 202-213). London: MacMillan. (Published in 1925)
• Harvey, D. (2005). Spaces of Neoliberalization: Towards a Theory of Uneven Geographical Development. Hettner-Lectures, Stuttgart: Franz Steiner Verlag.Lazzarato, M. (2009). Neoliberalism in Action: Inequality, Insecurity and the Reconstitution of the Social. Theory, Culture & Society, 26 (6), 109-133.
• Lazzarato, M. (2014). Debt, Neoliberalism and Crisis: Interview with Maurizio Lazzarato on the Indebted Condition. Interview by M. Charbonneau and M. P. Hansen, Sociology, 48 (5), 1039-1047.
• Lazzarato, M. (2015). Governing by Debt. J. D. Jordan (Trans.). South Pasadena: Semiotext(e).
• Lemke, T. (2011). Biopolitics: An Advanced Introduction. E. F. Trump (Trans.). New York&London: New York University Press.
• Lemke, T. (2012). Foucault, Governmentality, and Critique. Boulder, CO/London: Paradigm Publishers.
• Miller, P. and Rose, N. (2008). Introduction. P. Miller and N. Rose (Eds.), Governing the Present: Administering Economic, Social and Personal Life (p. 1-25). Cambridge&Malden: Polity.
• O’Connor, J. (1973), The Fiscal Crisis of the State. New Brunswick&London: Transaction Publishers.
• Rose, N. (1993). Government, Authority and Expertise in Advanced Liberalism. Economy and Society, 22 (3), 283-299.
• Rose, N. (1996). ‘Governing ‘Advanced’ Liberal Democracies. P. Miller and N. Rose (eds.), Foucault and Political Reason: Liberalism, Neo-liberalism, and Rationalities of Government (p. 37-64). Chicago: University of Chicago Press.
• Schumpeter, J. (1991). The Crisis of the Tax State. R. Swedberg (Ed.), Joseph A. Schumpeter: The Economics and Sociology of Capitalism (99-140). Princeton: Princeton University Press. (Published in 1918)
• Sennett, R. (2006). The Culture of the New Capitalism. New Haven&London: Yale University Press.
• Streeck, W. (2014). Buying Time: The Delayed Crisis of Democratic Capitalism. P. Camiller (Trans.). London/New York: Verso.
• Streeck, W. (2016). How Will Capitalism End? Essays on a Failing System. London/New York: Verso.