Security After the Great Recession

This thesis identifies changes in the meaning of “security”—that is, the conditions characterizing “the good life”—among millennials in postrecessional neoliberal states. The Great Recession of 2007–2009 affected everyday life by deepening wealth inequalities and normalizing downward mobility; however, no work has been done on how popular understandings of “the good life” are shifting in the wake of the recession or what conditions are driving such changes in common sense. In response to this gap, this thesis unpacks millennial expressions of security in Ireland, the United States, and Canada to uncover long-standing senses of security eroding among millennials, the ways in which postrecessional neoliberal governmentality is shattering these ideals, and emerging alternative understandings of security. In Ireland, I find that expansionary monetary policy—a regulatory technology of neoliberal governmentality—is preventing millennials from securing themselves through enriching property ownership and giving rise to a sense that security may instead be rooted in minimizing deprivation. In the United States, millennial expressions suggest that a technology of the self that I call “branding with goals” is frustrating the idea that security means making oneself legible as a popularly affirmed kind of subject; in its wake, security emerges with exploration and pleasure. In Canada, popular pedagogies in universities—disciplinary technologies—are shaking a sense that security can be achieved by completing a university degree to become in-demand human capital; this failure makes room for pedagogies that teach students to dwell with conflict and uncertainty. Together, these findings evidence that postrecessional governmentality is corroding senses of “security” rooted in the liberal ideal of self-determination and suggest that “security” may alternatively be caught up with a sense of collective, if differential, vulnerability. Broadly, this thesis contributes to critical theory by offering novel insights on postrecessional regulatory ideals and governmentality in neoliberal polities.

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