The growing concentration of wealth and the intensification of inequality is a defining feature of the twenty-first century. Debates on questions of economic inequality and exclusion have centered on the paradigm of “neoliberalism.” Feminists Rethink the Neoliberal State demonstrates that an understanding of such economic policies, the corresponding rise of socioeconomic inequality, and the possibilities for change require an in-depth reconceptualization of the nature of the state. Drawing on original field research in comparative contexts both globally and within the United States, the essays ... More

The growing concentration of wealth and the intensification of inequality is a defining feature of the twenty-first century. Debates on questions of economic inequality and exclusion have centered on the paradigm of “neoliberalism.” Feminists Rethink the Neoliberal State demonstrates that an understanding of such economic policies, the corresponding rise of socioeconomic inequality, and the possibilities for change require an in-depth reconceptualization of the nature of the state. Drawing on original field research in comparative contexts both globally and within the United States, the essays in the volume present a rich set of perspectives on the varied and often contradictory nature of state practices, structures, and ideologies in the post-liberalization era. In this endeavor, the volume disrupts the analytical drive to understand neoliberalism through a self-evident or singular market-led logic of privatization. The volume examines both what is distinctive about this post-liberalization state and what must be contextualized as long-standing features of modern state power. The essays develop an interdisciplinary approach to the post-liberalization state that treats an understanding of historically specific forms of inequality — such as gender, race, caste, sexuality and class — as integral to rather than as aftereffects of the policies and ideologies associated with the neoliberal project.