Neoliberalism, Media and the Political
Sean Phelan
Neoliberalism, Media and the Political presents a novel critical analysis of the condition of media and journalism in neoliberal cultures. Emphasizing neoliberalism's status as a political ideology that is simultaneously hostile to politics, the argument is grounded in empirical illustrations from different social contexts, including post-Rogernomics New Zealand, Celtic Tiger Ireland, the Leveson Inquiry into the UK press, and the climate-sceptic blogosphere. Phelan draws on a variety of theoretical sources, especially Laclau and Bourdieu, to affirm the importance of neoliberalism as an analytical concept. Yet, he also interrogates how critiques of neoliberalism – in media research and elsewhere – can reduce social practices to the category of neoliberal. Against the image of a monolithic free-market ideology that imposes itself on other domains, the book identifies the potential sites of a cultural politics within neoliberalized media regimes.
Table of contents
Acknowledgements
Introduction: Disfiguring Neoliberalism
1. Articulating Neoliberalism in Critical Media and Communication Studies
2. Neoliberal Discourse: Theory, History and Trajectories
3. Neoliberal Logics and Field Theory
4. Neoliberalism and Media Democracy: A Representative Anecdote from Post-Rogernomics New Zealand
5. The Journalistic Habitus and the Realist Style
6. Media Cultures, Anti-Politics and the 'Climategate' Affair
7. Neoliberal Imaginaries, Press Freedom and the Politics of Leveson
8. Media Rituals and the 'Celtic Tiger': The Neoliberal Nation and its Transnational Circulation
Conclusion: The Possibility of a Radical Media Politics
'Understanding how the concept and mechanics of neoliberalism work through and in the media and the consequences for
our political lives is one of the key issues of our times. Phelan manages to weave political economy with cultural studies, discourse theory with field theory alongside an historical analysis of the concept of neoliberalism, to offer an incisive and insightful
empirical critique of how neoliberalism gets mediated through contemporary issues… It should be required reading for any scholar interested in a critical media politics…'
- Natalie Fenton, Goldsmiths, University of London, UK
'If political theorists have sometimes been inclined to ignore the work of media and communication researchers, this book shows why they can no longer do so. Phelan offers a powerful analysis
of the political role media and journalism play in the performance of neoliberal logics.'
- Jason Glynos, University of Essex, UK
'Neoliberalism, Media and the Political
is a theoretically astute, politically engaged, and empirically grounded guide to the often-perplexing world of neoliberalized media. Sean Phelan goes beyond neoliberalism's willful misrepresentations, and beyond the ways that it likes to look at
itself in the mirror, to deliver a penetrating analysis of the actually existing, variegated, and often 'disfigured' forms of mediatized market rule.'
- Jamie Peck, author of Constructions of Neoliberal Reason
Palgrave Macmillan
November 2014
£60.00 |$95.00
For review copies, please contact Lauren Pettifer at [log in to unmask]
For further information, see http://www.palgrave.com/page/detail/neoliberalism-media-and-the-political-sean-phelan/?K=9781137308351
Sean Phelan (PhD)
Senior Lecturer
School of Communication, Journalism and Marketing
Massey University
PO Box 756
Wellington
Aotearoa New Zealand
Room: 5E07
Phone: +64 4 801 5799 ext 63539
Fax: +64 4 801 2693