Polity Care and Capitalism: Why Affective Equality Matters for Social Justice

The logics and ethics of neoliberal capitalism dominate public discourses and politics in the early twenty-first century. They morally endorse and institutionalize forms of competitive self-interest that jettison social justice values, and are deeply antithetical to love, care and solidarity. But capitalism is neither invincible nor inevitable. While people are self-interested, they are not purely self-interested: they are bound affectively and morally to others, even to unknown others. The cares, loves and solidarity relationships within which people are engaged give them direction and purpose in their daily lives. They constitute cultural residuals of hope that stand ready to move humanity beyond a narrow capitalism-centric set of values. In this instructive and inspiring book, Kathleen Lynch sets out to reclaim the language of love, care and solidarity both intellectually and politically and to place it at the heart of contemporary discourse. Her goal is to help unseat capital at the gravitational centre of meaning-making and value, thereby helping to create logics and ethical priorities for politics that are led by care, love and solidarity.