Fourth Global Conference on Economic Geography (Oxford, 19-22 August 2015)
Session: Financialisation of everyday life
Organisers: Shaun French (University of Nottingham), Karen Lai (National University of Singapore)
Increasing consumption of financial products and the growing acceptance of financial logics (particularly in the context of dwindling state-welfare benefits) are normalising risks and risk-taking behaviour in ever more areas of daily life. Changing practices of borrowing and saving are also seen in the rise of credit card and other debts, and savings being channeled into various forms of insurance and investment products rather than conventional bank deposits. However, increased anxiety and uncertainty over investments and returns may drive individuals to retreat to the safety of savings accounts, or even a rejection of financial market investments in favour of residential property. Changing state policies, new technologies on credit scoring and crowdfunding investment, and the rise of middle class consumers in developing economies are also changing the nature and impacts of financial consumption and financialised behaviour.
Papers that examine the financialisation of everyday life across different dimensions could include (but are not limited to):
– The formation and evolution of financial subjects
– Financialisation of the body, of health and of the life cycle
– Financialisation through property
– Changing forms of consumer credit and financial consumption
– Financial ecologies, financial exclusion and variegated financialisation
– State-subject relations, financial citizenship and securing the national economy
– The performativity of ‘popular’ finance (e.g. texts, images, financial mangers, investment gurus)
Please send abstracts (of maximum 250 words) or enquiries to Karen Lai (karenlai@nus.edu.sg) by 30 April 2015.
For more information about the Fourth Global Conference on Economic Geography, please visit: http://www.gceg2015.org
