The Old is Dying and the New Cannot Be Born: From Progressive Neoliberalism to Trump and Beyond

Neoliberalism is fracturing, but what will emerge in its wake?

The global political, ecological, economic, and social breakdown—symbolized by Trump’s election—has destroyed faith that neoliberal capitalism is beneficial to the majority. Nancy Fraser explores how this faith was built through the late twentieth century by balancing two central tenets: recognition (who deserves rights) and distribution (who deserves income). When these begin to fray, new forms of outsider populist politics emerge on the left and the right.

These, Fraser argues, are symptoms of the larger crisis of hegemony for neoliberalism, a moment when, as Gramsci had it, “the old is dying and the new cannot be born.”

In an accompanying interview with Jacobin publisher Bhaskar Sunkara, Fraser argues that we now have the opportunity to build progressive populism into an emancipatory social force.

• In the Ruins of Neoliberalism: The Rise of Antidemocratic Politics in the West (The Wellek Library Lectures)
• Capitalism: A Conversation in Critical Theory
• Feminism for the 99%: A Manifesto
• Fortunes of Feminism: From State-Managed Capitalism to Neoliberal Crisis
• Family Values: Between Neoliberalism and the New Social Conservatism (Zone / Near Futures)
• Redistribution or Recognition?: A Political-Philosophical Exchange
• Trump
• Democracy May Not Exist, but We'll Miss It When It's Gone
• How to Be an Anticapitalist in the Twenty-First Century
• Undoing the Demos: Neoliberalism's Stealth Revolution (Zone / Near Futures)