Global Libidinal Economy

<p><b>Claims unconscious desire plays a constitutive role in global political economy.</b></p><p>This is the first book to examine global political economy from a psychoanalytic perspective. It claims that the libidinal-the site of unconscious desire-plays not a supplementary or trivial but a constitutive role in global political economy. Consumption for example is not simply a way of satisfying a material or biological need but a doomed attempt at soothing our deeply held sense of loss; and capital is not just a means to material growth and prosperity but is invested with drive that seduces beguiles and manipulates in the service of unending accumulation. Thus in contrast to political economy which assumes a rational subject libidinal economy is founded on the notion of a desiring subject who obeys a logic not of good sense or self-interest but profligacy and irrationality. By applying a psychoanalytic lens <i>Global Libidinal Economy</i> thereby seeks to uncover the unconscious excesses and antagonisms emergent in such key political economy categories as production trade and ecology while also bringing out significant contemporary themes relating to gender and race.</p>