The Economization of Life

Michelle Murphy

Published by Duke University Press 2017

The Economization of Life

Michelle Murphy

https://doi.org/10.1515/9780822373216

Overview
Contents

About this book

Michelle Murphy examines the ways in which efforts at population control since World War II have tied reproduction to neoliberal capitalism, showing how data collection practices have been used to quantify the value of a human life in terms of its ability to improve the nation-state's gross domestic product.

Author / Editor information

Michelle Murphy is Professor of History and Women and Gender Studies at the University of Toronto and the author of Seizing the Means of Reproduction: Entanglements of Feminism, Heath, and Technoscience and Sick Building Syndrome and the Problem of Uncertainty: Environmental Politics, Technoscience, and Women Workers, both also published by Duke University Press.

Reviews

"Though this book be concise, it is fierce. It can be read, and reread, with profit by undergraduates, graduate students, and researchers. Highly recommended."

-- T. E. Sullivan Choice

"The Economization of Life convincingly links experimentality to what has been one of the most popular developmental trends of the past two decades. . . . Michelle Murphy’s bold and sharp book opens many new lines of inquiries."

-- Stephen Macekura Diplomatic History

"This is a valuable book that should be read by anyone who is interested in the mid-twentieth-century population control movement, including its history and socioeconomic context, or anyone who still adheres to the neoliberal view that population growth (or 'overpopulation,' as it is often called) has been and continues to be one of the greatest problems facing human society."

-- Garland E. Allen Isis

"Murphy weaves helpful threads of history, literature, and economics, guides the reader through complicated ideas, and leaves enough notes so research can continue beyond the book’s borders. . . . The Economization of Life is a useful and an instructive tool for policy makers and researchers on population and reproductive health, and for scholars and students in gender, women, and sexuality studies, or anyone who may be concerned with matters of reproductive rights."

-- Kira Frank Wagadu

"It takes a study as rigorous as Murphy’s to expose the double-edged nature of human capital: galvanizing self-improvement of, and popular support for, underprivileged populations, even as it does so according to metrics that have investor interests—rather than general well-being—as their goal."

-- Hadas Weiss Public Books

"The Economization of Life is a book that sticks. Author Michelle Murphy delicately surfaces the history and persistence of racist and eugenicist logics as they comprise global economies and state governance practices, and, in a bold and self-reflexive gesture, describes how these same logics operate in feminist organizations and academic research. Murphy's work forced me to grapple with unresolvable tensions, particularly between long term liberation and short term survival, which were simultaneously troubling and eye-opening. I can see these now in places where they used to be hidden."

-- Lourdes Vera Somatosphere

"The Economization of Life gives us important tools to bring the work of reproductive justice from the world of feminist social justice organizing to the world of feminist scholarship. It shows us that the economy is an effect that materializes its own causes, supported by a structure of belief that holds together otherwise disparate data and calculations. With enough effort, it urges us, we should be able to divest from that enabling belief, and instead follow models for a regenerative politics, committing instead to reproductive justice as an infrastructure of regeneration."

-- Kalindi Vora Somatosphere

Topics

Frontmatter Publicly Available Download PDF	i
Contents Publicly Available Download PDF	v
Acknowledgments Publicly Available Download PDF	vii
Introduction: Bottles and Curves Requires Authentication Unlicensed Licensed Download PDF	1
Arc I. Phantasmagrams of Population and Economy
01. Economy as Atmosphere Requires Authentication Unlicensed Licensed Download PDF	17
02. Demographic Transitions Requires Authentication Unlicensed Licensed Download PDF	35
03. Averted Birth Requires Authentication Unlicensed Licensed Download PDF	47
04. Dreaming Technoscience Requires Authentication Unlicensed Licensed Download PDF	55
Arc II. Reproducing Infrastructures
05 Infrastructures of Counting and Affect Requires Authentication Unlicensed Licensed Download PDF	59
06 Continuous Incitement Requires Authentication Unlicensed Licensed Download PDF	73
07 Experimental Exuberance Requires Authentication Unlicensed Licensed Download PDF	78
08 Dying, Not Dying, Not Being Born Requires Authentication Unlicensed Licensed Download PDF	95
09 Experimental Otherwise Requires Authentication Unlicensed Licensed Download PDF	105
Arc III. Investable Life
10 Invest in a Girl Requires Authentication Unlicensed Licensed Download PDF	113
11 Exhausting Data Requires Authentication Unlicensed Licensed Download PDF	125
12 Unaligned Feeling Requires Authentication Unlicensed Licensed Download PDF	133
Coda: Distributed Reproduction Requires Authentication Unlicensed Licensed Download PDF	135
Notes Requires Authentication Unlicensed Licensed Download PDF	147
Bibliography Requires Authentication Unlicensed Licensed Download PDF	179
Index Requires Authentication Unlicensed Licensed Download PDF	211

Language: English
Publisher: Duke University Press
Audience: Professional and scholarly;
Pages
- Main content: 232
Illustrations
- Other: 25 illustrations

eBook

Published: May 18, 2017
ISBN: 9780822373216