Neoliberalism and community

: a conceptual analysis of neoliberal austerity and its variegated impacts on community in Bristol

Abstract

This study is a conceptual analysis of neoliberalism, made up of a literature review on the one hand and a case study, document analysis and interviews on the other. On this basis, this study explores the variegated impacts of neoliberalism - as manifest in austerity - on community, situated in a case study of Bristol. The dynamics that emerge reveal differentiated impacts of neoliberal austerity on community; while many aspects of community have been eroded, particularly for deprived areas, for wealthy areas the gaps left by the retreating state can offer opportunities for some groups to provide in its absence. In exploring this topic, I examine first, the importance of community and how to foster it; second, the notions of neoliberalism and neoliberalisation; and finally, how these manifest through austerity to shape communities in Bristol. Rather then seeing neoliberalism as the source of all ills, this study analyses how it interplays with numerous other processes and factors to shape community; in doing so, I find a subtle but important contribution by neoliberalism in eroding many aspects of community, and with it, helping to create the rhetoric of the atomized individual.

Date of Award	5 Dec 2018
Original language	English
Awarding Institution	University of Bristol
Supervisor	Oscar J B Berglund (Supervisor)