Il neoliberismo sociale

Social neo-liberalism, Jacques Donzelot - The author recognises a new pattern in the combination of urban policies consisting of neoliberalist principles and the results of local resistance by society and institutions. A new urban question is arising from the operational conditions of global capitalism and at the same time public policies are undergoing profound reorientation, but they are not disappearing and they are succeeding in effecting a shift in the field of the principles of competition. Put briefly, they are producing a sort of ‘inflection’, a social accent of liberalism. The social question of the 20th Century was characterised by social conflict, conflict which is distinguished by opposition from below upwards. The logic today is that of separation and it is leading the rich to distance themselves from the poor, from the different social and ethnic groups and to retreat to protect themselves and conserve their economic expectations and cultural values. To conclude, the classic social policies, drawn up in the welfare state, place the accent on collective mobilisation and on the conquests that they produce. Neoliberal social policies differ above all in the relationship between the individual and society: the notion of citizenship changes in this transformation.

Jacques Donzelot, Il neoliberismo sociale in "TERRITORIO" 46/2008, pp 89-92, DOI: