Neoliberalism and Cyberpunk Science Fiction

<p>Caroline Alphin presents an original exploration of biopolitics by examining it through the lens of cyberpunk science fiction.</p><p>Comprised of five chapters <i>Neoliberalism and Cyberpunk Science Fiction</i> is guided by four central themes: biopolitics intensification resilience and accelerationism. The first chapters examine the political possibilities of cyberpunk as a genre of science fiction and introduce one kind of neoliberal subject the self-monitoring cyborg. These are individuals who join fitness/health tracking devices and applications to their body to self-cultivate. Here Alphin presents concrete examples of how fitness trackers are a strategy of neoliberal governmentality under the guise of self-cultivation. Moving away from Foucault’s biopolitics to themes of intensity and resilience Alphin draws largely from William Gibson’s <em>Neuromancer</em> Neal Stephenson’s <em>Snow Crash</em> Richard K. Morgan’s <em>Altered Carbon</em> along with the film <em>Blade Runner</em> to problematize notions of neoliberal resilience. Alphin returns to biopolitics intensity and resilience connecting these themes to accelerationism as she engages with biohacker discourses. Here she argues that a biohacker is in part an intensification of the self-monitoring cyborg and accelerationism is in the end another form of resilience.</p><p><i>Neoliberalism and Cyberpunk Science Fiction </i>is an invaluable resource for those interested in security studies political sociology biopolitics critical IR theory political theory cultural studies and literary theory.</p>