Variegated neo-liberalism, finance-dominated accumulation and citizenship

This chapter revisits claims in the light of the growing financialisation of social relations and the rise of neo-liberalisation as an economic and political project. It introduces two working definitions and then modifies them to reflect further theoretical arguments and recent empirical trends. The chapter then explores the implications of economic and political changes in the last four decades for the alleged affinity between capitalism and democracy. Specifically, it considers important transformations in capitalist social relations and their associated challenges to the form, functions and legitimacy of post-war democratic national territorial states. The chapter considers how neo-liberalism alters the viability of democratic forms of governance at different sites and scales of economic and political organisation. It explains the rise of authoritarian statism and an enduring austerity state and to link these trends to the decline of citizenship rights.