Assessing the Metaphor and Impact of
ZOMBIE ECONOMICS
Thesis by Tom Forster - 10623345
University of Amsterdam Graduate School of Humanities MA Arts & Culture: Comparative Cultural Analysis 2014/2015
Supervisor: Joost de Bloois Second Reader: Jules Strum
As metaphors for illicit globalisation, zombies have emerged as a key pop-culture
referent of the porous nature of socio-cultural, political, and physical boundaries in a
global age defined by an emotional geopolitics of fear (Saunders 80) 1
For the modern citizen, if social and political conditions and one’s own life are perceived as capable of being arranged and influenced by one’s own (co)decisions, the citizens - believing in collective - voluntarily subject themselves to the conditions of
soci-ety (Lorey 4)
All italicised quotations throughout this thesis have been added for emphasis by the author and are not 1
Introduction (4)
Object Introduction: Zombie Economics (9) Michel Serres: A Philosopher of Survivability (11)
Section 1: How Zombie Economics Created a Zombie Apparatus (15) The Zombie Economy (15)
The Culture of the Zombie Economy (18) Section1: Conclusion (23)
Management Model Phase 1 (25)
Section 2: Visual Management Models: Potential Tools for Survivability (26) Visual Management Models: Facilitators of Zombie-ism (29)
A Case Study: Lean Manufactoring (35) Section 2: Conclusion (37)
Section 3: The Zombie Apparatus and Survival Thinking (40) Dual Economy: Dual Apparatus (40)
Types of Thinking (45) Section 3: Conclusion (50) Management Model Phase 2 (53)
Section 4: Survival Thinking & Its Environment (54) Survivability Introduction (54)
Covert Self Aware Survivors - Rise of the Anti-Hero/Fall of the Bad Guy (55) Manufactured Survivability & Purposeful Precarity (62)
Section 4: Conclusion (67) Management Model Phase 3 (70)
Conclusion: Survivability as a Theoretical Concept (71) Bibliography (76)
Introduction 2
The zombie metaphor is a particularly intriguing description of capitalism as it represents everything that humans do not want to be. To a human a zombie cannot think, it cannot feel, its behaviour is irrational, its cannibalistic, its self-destructive and its semi-immortal; which is per-haps the only aspect that a human might like to embrace, but in regards to the economic “com-pensation principle”, the sacrifice of the latter is probably not worth the change (Stiglitz 2012, 72). Despite this, powerful western institutions have committed to undead principles with little regard to culture, now polluted with a common zombie-nomic epistemology.
Thankfully, there are ‘spirits’ in zombies. A dilemma that commonly arises in popular media demonstrating the zombie concept. For instance, the scenes that involve a newly undead family member with a still human next of kin debating on pulling the trigger acknowledging the existence of a such a spirit; that there is something still there and we identify with it, despite it being encapsulated in an immoral zombie ethos. However, as this paper aims to show, in the capi-talist context of a zombie economic metaphor (Stiglitz 2015), the human is entirely subservient and in no position to execute alternatives or competitive innovation. The very bedrock of a suc-cessful capitalist structure. This leaves the human at the whim of uncertainty and instability as we struggle to understand the evolving logic, or “spirit” (Land & Scott 202) of zombie capitalism.
Returning to the fact that a zombie discourse speaks very effective volumes in economics (Quiggin 2012; Saunders 80; Stiglitz 2015; Lorey 4), we must concern ourselves with the point that the metaphor is almost exhausted as this research believes. Very recently, there has been un-precedented growth in popular culture to connote the ethos of a zombie to any object that even
Parts of this thesis were taken from materials written by the author during the academic year 2014/2015 2
on MA Arts & Culture: Comparative Cultural Analysis; Intercultural Dialogues 1 & Narrative & Globali-sation
hints space for such a criticism (Saunders 80). We forget that the traditional zombie narrative re-volves around the perspective of the survivors, a neglected dynamic in this discourse which cer-tainly could be used to enhance the entire metaphor. Survivors ‘fight’ zombies, undeterred by the unprecedented odds against them because of their differentiating origins, identities and goals. Finding the survivors within this metaphorical imagery and developing their identity, as this pa-per will show, significantly enhances the zombie economy metaphor. If survivability is a counter-part to the zombie, then outlining that cognitive process and evidencing its existence reveals the damaging extent of zombie economics.
Moreover it is not limited to be only a scientific, capitalist metaphor. Before the themes mainstream underscoring in 2012’s Zombie Economics: How Dead Ideas Still Walk Among Us by Australian economist John Quiggin, other heterodox economists such as Ha-Joon Chang (23 3
Things They Don't Tell you About Capitalism (2010)) and Joseph Stiglitz (The Price of Inequality
(2012)) echoed a very similar ethos throughout their works. Themes of the centralised society “slowly marching” (Stiglitz 2012, 362) through a “global economy [that] lies in tatters” (Chang 2010, 1) sets the scene for the dystopian apocalypse in our globalised finances. Accordingly, those same economists state that policies of the kind are never limited to control only finance. Economics governs the quality of life and because of this it has a profound affect on culture. For instance, German and Japanese societies were once deemed “unorganised” and “lazy” by the UK, Australia and US. Those reputations presented today couldn't be further from the reality, and eco-nomics was the agent for that transformation (Chang 2007, 200).
This scientific/cultural interdependency, once exclaimed by many great humanities thinkers such as Michel Serres and Michel Foucault (LaTour 8), is now in tandem with modern
Heterodox economics is a field outside that of “mainstream economics”; sometimes thought of as too 3
economic criticism. Chang wrote in 2007’s Bad Samaritans (200) and reaffirmed in 23 Things thereafter (123) that the economy we live in notably influences our cultural nuances as societies; thus indicating a potential “pollution” of zombie-nomics to a much deeper core than that of our pockets (Serres 31). TV shows Breaking Bad and House of Cards as cultural objects, will help define this cognitive zombie invasion from economics, and outline examples of survivability as its counteraction. However, whilst on the topic of TV shows, it is worth underscoring that this thesis does not analyse zombie objects directly as I am attempting to theorise survivability against the zombie metaphor which now ‘parallels reality’ (Saunders 80). The Walking Dead and its pop-ularity, whilst providing some brief essentials of survivability, merely scratches the surface of our resonance with that metaphor. Digging deeper into other cultural objects that have nothing to do with the zombie directly provides a much more rewarding analysis into the covert cultural pollu-tion of zombie-isms. Prominent scientist and humanities philosopher Michel Serres (whose methods will serve as the core cultural concepts for this paper), posited a type of detrimental sci-entific “cultural pollution” in our mindsets as early as 1992’s The Natural Contact (31). This in-fers the severity of a long lasting zombie infection spanning decades before today’s vocalised Zombie Austerity criticisms in economics (Stiglitz 2015).
Serres’s philosophy is central to coining survivability, as will be shown later in his own detailed introduction. For the time being, methodologically, he links the distant subjects of eco-nomics and cultural analysis. His lens promotes to academia a capability to shift between disci-plines, broadly in his case between science and philosophy, or for this instance heterodox eco-nomics and cultural analysis. More specifically, his method cries the importance of each disci-plines interconnected wellbeing to critique each other towards betterment (LaTour 47).
In what temporality is the scholasticism of the text imprisoned? The bifurcated relationship between science and literature was so frozen, so distant, that the two eterni-ties seemed to be looking at each other, like two porcelain dogs - like two stone lions flanking a doorway (LaTour 47)
Serres’s method also takes into consideration the danger of scientific dominance, further expanding the zombie metaphor. Like a zombie, sciences hunger for innovation leads it to the creativity of the survivor to then consume it, but in turn, rearranges the survivors creative poetry into a scientific state of mind therefore removing whatever creative dynamism that remained (LaTour 87). Similarly, in a zombie dominated world, the opposing survivor party is deceived into wishing to be consumed by that culture because of such inherent levels of zombie predomi-nance. A predominance well feared and articulated by the Foucauldian “apparatus” school of thought from the 1970’s. Confessions of the Flesh outlined a theory of purposeful fine tuning of state institutions that govern knowledge, administration and infrastructure for a preordained cause (Foucault 194).
Given Serres’s appropriate method to substantiation, a zombie apparatus conquered sci-ence and imbedded culture long before its current popularity. Despite this detrimentally, we commit to it biases consistently, even labelling world leaders as culprits for consuming our cre-ative poetry: “Nothing testifies to the resonance of the zombie more than the diffusion of the term in everyday political discourse.” (Saunders 98) The very fact that people critique a leaders dis-course in such a way is evident of a survivors thinking, these thoughts then becoming a target of consumption for the zombie society. Creating coexistence between the demands of leaders (commanding a zombie society) and the survivors will to remain creative is the key dynamic. Es-sentially, outlining the survivor society and then theorising its economic realignment to appease
to both parties; the zombie and the survivor. Using heterodox economics and philosophy, this cul-tural analysis will interject with the destructive apparatus while it is still in motion, so that we can progress via “the two stone lions flanking [the] doorway” (LaTour 47) to what could be a more universally beneficial school of thought. To that end, this research will discuss:
• Object Introduction: Zombie Economics. • Michel Serres: A Philosopher of Survivability.
• Section 1: How Zombie Economics Created a Zombie Apparatus. • Section 2: Management Models: Potential Tools for Survivability. • Section 3: The Zombie Apparatus and Survival Thinking.
• Section 4: Survival Thinking & Its Environment. • Conclusion: Survivability as a Theoretical Concept.
Structurally, each of these sections hosts subsections that allow for a thematic panorama around the central thesis, then leading to their individual managerial conclusions for how best to align these ideologies, the zombie and the survivor. However, each sections conclusion will also display a visualised management model which consists of the results drawn from the cultural analysis. In doing this, I hope to conjure more pragmatic thoughts that could be used outside of institutions, as Serres states “when philosophy is trapped in academia it doesn't move much” (La-Tour 45). A visualised “management model is a ‘stable’ theoretical framework that can be used to observe, create and asses real life organisational ‘situations’ in order to make desired (future) im-provements” (Eskildsen et al. 4). My ‘framework’ is separated into three conclusive phases of
development from section one, three and four with section two discussing the object of visualised management models.
In regards to Lawrence Grossberg and Serres, who call for an evolutionary type of art 4
and culture if it is to survive, perhaps management models are the signature to that prescription (Grossberg 110; LaTour 45). This paper takes progressive steps towards battling zombie-ism and its ‘tools’ (Section Two: Management Models: Potential Tools for Survivability), whilst maintain-ing its humanities origin. Furthermore on that point, thematically layered throughout this thesis is a cry for the interdisciplinary which is especially reinforced by Serres (LaTour 45). With the in-duction of a management model taken from business theory and colliding it with cultural analysis in the second section, I hope to practice what I preach. Moreover, ones definition of a cultural object can vary greatly. For me, management models are just as much an artistic object as is film; influencing your emotional capacity to see things differently. In line with the thoughts of Serres I hope to develop past: “Notice, here, this concept sheds light on that problem. It’s up to you to de-velop the details at your own leisure. Good-bye, I’ve got to be going elsewhere” (LaTour 68), given that the humanities can no longer act as an idyll or post-critique of faster moving fields if it wishes to be truly relevant in contemporary debate (Grossberg 1; Alaimo 560).
Object Introduction: Zombie Economics. Recent years have seen an increased focus on
the discourse of zombies (Saunders 81). Since 2012, the zombie has had a particularly interesting impact on heterodox economics as the term has proven to be particularly effective in labelling and challenging mainstream economic principles. A zombie metaphor ticks all the boxes as we attempt to understand the problem, reinforced by Saunders: “contemporary depictions of the
Cultural Studies in the Future Tense (2010) directly outlines the potential of using cultural analysis to 4
critique heterodox economics (110). As an overall text, it broadly talks about the future of cultural analy-sis.
walking dead touch a chord deep in the collective psyche, particularly in a world where the old safeguards of Gemeinschaft have evaporated” (99). 5
Since the information revolution of the past few decades, societies now have unlimited access to anything that stimulates curiosity. Enlightenment eras were previously restricted to those with higher educations focused on specified subjects. The provision and immersion of modern technology removes that social barrier and the raw information is readily available for analysis, consumption, belief and disbelief.
However, one problem here is that the information is too raw, and speaks the language of those that until recently have had soul responsibility in moulding the terminology amongst them-selves for centuries. Especially in the sciences that govern our society (such governance is de-fined as “technocracy”); accountancy, economics, legal, political and medical schools of thought have forged a language within a language, taking decades to learn fluently. In turn, these profes-sional languages cannot truly provide societies with the right type of digest required to make de-mocratic decisions, the type of decisions based on clear understanding.
As minds are immersed in translating these complications, the humanities have never been more important to society in providing a path of resonance. With the key in the title, the humanities represent the study of our human creations, often focusing on linking seemingly dis-tant disciplines. Heterodox economics labelling an extremely serious scientific critique with a farcical artistic mythology, such as the zombie, signifies desperation to connect with those mate-rials. Public perceptions of economics are therefore, as occasionally supported by economists (Chang 2010, 168), becoming just as farcical. Similar ridicule for example already haunts
Social relations between individuals, based on close personal and family ties; community. Contrasted 5
cians, hedge funds and investment bankers. Moreover, the success of literary publications that have embraced the zombie as an economic concept further reinforces the concern.
These texts include 2012’s Zombie Economics: How Dead Ideas Still Walk Among Us by Australian economist John Quiggin, which introduced the main discourse and closely analyses the links between mainstream economics and the zombie. More recently the critically acclaimed 2015’s Austerity: The Demolition of the Welfare State and the Rise of the Zombie Economy by Kerry-Anne Mendoza, focuses on the UK as a case study to exemplify the depth of a zombie economy in society. As well as these, more prominent heterodox economists such as Ha-Joon Chang and Joseph Stiglitz have indirectly reaffirmed the zombie suspicion in their works; draw-ing similar conclusions despite usdraw-ing more scientific terminology. These four authors and their interlinked theories provide the starting object for this thesis, that is; zombie economics.
Michel Serres: A Philosopher of Survivability. Chang specifically made way for a
cultur-al ancultur-alysis and for the induction of concepts exterior to economics. Both of Chang’s texts, Bad
Samaritans (200) and 23 Things (123) include dedicated chapters focusing on the cultural
cations of the mainstream theories he was critiquing. Not only does he identify the cultural impli-cations to his theories, he also welcomes new fields of thought through his conclusive reinforce-ment of a pubic that embraces “active economic citizenship” (Chang 2010, xvi). Thus, breaking down institutional barriers and making for a fairer democracy when it comes to understanding future economic decisions.
From insinuating an emphasis on more interdisciplinary thought, he potentially addresses for a humanities counterpart that also strongly advocates for such a breakdown (Chang 2010, xvi; LaTour 68). Serving as that humanities counterpart, Michel Serres dedicated a career to philoso-phy that theorises interdependency between the humanities and the sciences where Chang is
based. Serres’s acclaimed philosophy awarded him as one of the current 40 ‘immortals’ of the Academie française, a council of academics that governs French language, philosophy, culture and art. Although an informal title, that metaphor of immortality in contrast with this papers study of survivability sets his context, with the works of his peers surviving from as far back as 1635. Inherently Serres work will undoubtably survive all of us. Furthermore, part of his professional duties within this institute is to “defend the French language”, ensuring its survivability against unnecessary linguistic evolutions (“Académie française”). 6
Serres was educated in Paris during the reconstruction of Western Europe after WW2. He grew up in a culture of survivability as the French capital recovered its identity against a disas-trous apocalyptic backdrop. A philosophy of survivability for the context of this paper, starts with him. Discussing his method, Serres’s self-stated contribution to French literature, and therefore to this paper, are childhood upbringings in “spirits of rebirth” after “atmospheres of death” (LaTour 42); metaphors that congregate around the notion of survivability; defeating the odds and rising from ashes.
When a person’s life begins with the experience and atmosphere of death, it can only move forward in an ongoing spirit of birth, of rebirth, of a positive and overflowing wellspring of exhilaration. Whom do I thank for having rescued me from all that, for hav-ing had such luck? After that dark tableau of history I must exalt the magnificence of an existence dedicated, minute by minute, in great enthusiasm, to a life’s work whose value I no doubt will never truly know - a dubitative and fragile marvel (LaTour 42)
These defences have included restricting anglicisms such as Walkman, Software and Email from the 6
Having survived as a child through this dark tableau of history, his mind would have been moulded in such a way that compliments a cultural survivability out of respect for those that died to ensure it. He combines science and the humanities so that they may develop, not critique each other; so that they can prosper past their own comfortable universe as a survivor does. To me, his thoughts in Conversations on Science, Culture and Time (1995) echo that nurturing yet pragmatic mentality of survivability. Indeed, perhaps a cognitive counteraction to the hoards of young Ger-man men that invaded France in 1940 to implement “one law” (Serres 14), metaphorically reso-nant to that of a zombie invasion.
In contrast to that dark tableau of history, present day economists have reflected upon a tangible yet metaphorical atmosphere of death beginning after the 2008 Great Recession, with zombie economics spearheading that notion. We are: “slowly marching” (Stiglitz 2012, 362) through a: “global economy [that] lies in tatters” (Chang 2010, 1), which sets the scene for the economical undead that now governs life. Serres philosophy for this paper provides the founda-tional philosophy of survivability against that of zombie economics if we are to move on with prosperity, “spirits of rebirth” after the Great Recession and its “atmosphere of death” (LaTour 42).
His method epitomises how swift movements between analytical disciplines draws out both their weaknesses and benefits, an equal battleground, before combining these results into an effective critique of our society. Western society, which is exceptionally powerful at keeping these disciplines apart misses the merits of combining distant thoughts. “There is often a serious 7
lag between philosophical debate and scientific information” (LaTour 45). He states that the goal of cultural theory and philosophy is create new concepts of thought that are unexplored, but those new thoughts cannot exist without science (LaTour 45). When used in the right way, scientific
Better personified by Michel Foucault, who will also provide relevant concepts in this paper. 7
principles, then, such as heterodox economics and management theory make that philosophy a tangible reality.
Escorted by extracts of his methodological insights from Conversations on Science,
Cul-ture and Time (1995) (where Michel Serres was interviewed by Bruno LaTour) this paper will use
Serres’s self-described thoughts as an umbrella concept to cypher out survival philosophy from the zombie economy. Having Serres's method substantiate this first approach, I will then use oth-er objects from journalism, popular culture, scientific studies, management theory and litoth-erature that are more tangible in counterpart with his survival philosophy. Finally, as this paper will show later, the infection of a zombie apparatus is of epic proportions, which either demands for great compromise or an entire reset. Serres, having been educated during the reconstruction of western society after WW2, provides an experienced philosophical perspective for epitomising survival against the ‘inevitable economic turmoil that lies ahead’ (Chang 2010, 253). Sciences and the humanities for Serres, is a combinative formula for that ultimate survival, for rebuilding and for-tifying. His life's work highlights the dispositions of each in an attempt to bring about a balance, a framework and future that ensures the survival of betterment.
Rather than a dedicated close reading, Serres work will be sporadically interjected throughout this thesis as and when his thoughts align with my arguments. His inclusion has been done in this way for two reasons. One, I hope to continue his defensive aspirations in regards to the humanities: “This is behind my temptation to write a defence and an illustration of the
hu-manities in the face of, in opposition to, and for the benefit of scientists [or, economists]
them-selves” (LaTour 55). And two, a homage to his elegant “freedom of thought” (LaTour 43): “In the comparative disciplines you can find yourself in ancient Rome then poof! In Ireland and Wales then, without a pause, poof! in Vedic India” (LaTour 44). With less emphasis on structuring sur-vival philosophy, I hope to recreate his proud spontaneity towards an argument.
Section 1: How Zombie Economics Created a Zombie Apparatus
The Zombie Economy. As once put by the conservative Prime-Minister Winston
Churchill: “Capitalism is worst economic system apart from all the others”, marking the negative discourse about a system which is noted by many as an effective philosophy for overall human development (Chang 2010, 253). Capitalism and its markets have been mismanaged to the point where it is constantly challenged as the culprit for gross inequality in the world. This is perfectly captured by ex-Bush Administration Housing Secretary, Catherine Fitts (resigned in 2004) who questions how some people know for a fact that market economies do not work when we have never actually had them. She underlines that “when you have a group of people in power…who have the power to kill with impunity, and can steal and engineer the financial system or technolo-gy…to centralise power, that’s not a market economy, that’s not even capitalism, that’s organised crime.” (Fitts).
Returning to Stiglitz’s text The Price of Inequality (2012) and its focused discourse of defining the 1%’s apparatus, a contemporary and scientifically reinforced finger is pointed to those who now dictate an unhealthy and normalised inequality in the US. His conversations are strongly echoed in other economic texts that specifically describe the rise of “Zombie Austerity” (Stiglitz 2015). In particular, the works of Mendoza and Quiggin mentioned earlier. Overall, the negative discourse on capitalism appears to focus on the 1% apparatus, that in turn hoards the masses and therefore begins to reflect the zombie imagery as the 99% conforms. Ac-cording to Mendoza, “The real economy is being fed to the zombie economy - a night-of-the-liv-ing-dead economy that consumes value and defecates debt” (21). Debt, then, is the distinguishing attribute held by its victims which is now everywhere; national debt, student debt, personal debt. Somewhere along the line, the notion of what good debt and bad debt was substantially blurred as
credit cards and consequently the ownership of debt became a fashion statement (Park & Burns 135). Despite this problematic, many other aspects of debts symptoms are framed into the public gaze for questioning. Mendoza highlights a type of political/media scapegoating in the media to conceptualise a sociological culture who embraces austerity and the repayment of debt that doesn't even belong to those paying it back (88-106). For instance, the amount paid by the UK government (then cut from the welfare state thereafter) to keep “alive” those banks that managed the debt creation and circulation, amounts to £850 billion. “For this amount the UK could have funded the entire NHS for 8 years, its whole education system for 20 years or provided 200 years of Job Seekers Allowance” (Mendoza 19). In this light, the immoral and self-detrimental aspects displayed by a zombie are strongly reflected in her hypothesis as it becomes clearer where gov-ernmental priorities lie.
The economic figures are disconcerting, although, statistics often don't effectively repre-sent a human reality. With this in mind, consider the following comment from Stiglitz:
Nothing illustrates what has happened more vividly than the plight of today’s twenty-year-olds. Instead of starting a new life, fresh with enthusiasm and hope, many of them confront a world of anxiety and fear. Burdened with student loans that they know they will struggle to repay and that wouldn’t be reduced even if they were bankrupt, they search for good jobs in a dismal market. If they are lucky enough to get a job, the wages will be a disappointment, often so low that they will have to keep living with their par-ents (Stiglitz 2012, 332)
The contemporary position is bleak, and in support of Stiglitz is best spearheaded via the situation of today’s youth.
Zombie austerity, as a conclusive definition, appears to disregard compassionate and hu-mane aspects of society (the welfare state, education, healthcare, arts) in favour of a “motivation-al instability” to increase person“motivation-al we“motivation-alth in the 1% that will supposedly “trickledown” the class system (Mendoza 26-27; Chang 2010, 137; Lorey 9). Indeed, much like a mythological zombie that seeks to consume humane ethics. Nothing is left behind by the 1%, exemplified by the failure of trickledown economics (Chang 2010, 137) and in an even more zombie-nomic fashion, the staggering fact that it is legally allow it to happen (Mendoza 97).
The humanities aspects of market economies have dissolved particularly rapidly over the past three decades as governments have made neoliberal adjustments that favour finance liquidity rather than social mobility (Chang 2010, 260): “.as markets become more short sighted, such hu-man policies (welfare state, arts, academia) no longer seemed profitable” (Stiglitz 2012, 156). GDP as a communication concept, for instance, is prioritised over statistical happiness and that is hardly ever the other way around (Anholt). Usually it is the case when decreasing happiness be-comes an eventual threat to profitability when appropriation towards happiness induced. The economic discourse follows a regime of science first, humanities thereafter (LaTour 86).
Serres has selected one specific moment where culture allowed for their subservience to scientific principles, including the science of economic logic over less tangible humanities thoughts. This moment, captured bellow, created a cultural vortex for all people, not just govern-ments, to now uphold science and its logic as a font of god-like, tangible power. The logic of sci-ence was previously undeniable, but after this moment, its logic was universally feared:
Hiroshima was truly the end of one world and the beginning of a new adventure. Science had just gained such power that it could virtually destroy the planet. That makes a big impression. Sciences rise to power supposes such a level of recruitment that soon,
all-powerful, it creates a vacuum around itself. Which is the reason for the sudden decline of all the surrounding areas of culture - the humanities, arts, religion, even the legal sys-tem (LaTour 87)
With this moment, according to Serres, humans pivoted towards scientific subservience and away humanities developments and their surrounding areas of culture. This historical event, I would argue, is the origin of zombie austerity; a product of a subservient scientific culture. Be-cause of Hiroshima, humans grew to fear science and as a result are less likely to question it. A destruction of Hiroshima’s magnitude had never previously existed. It is only in natural disasters where you would find a similar death toll, with the exception here being instantaneousness . The 8
power of nature, for the first time in history, had been beaten by the power of science. When such levels of power are displayed, humans can only become servants to that fearful mythology. Eco-nomics, despite being born as a philosophy for household management in ancient Greece, grew to become a science that emancipates us from dogma and bias. Ironically, it now ensures those very illnesses as that fear became unquestionable truth. Scientific principles became a new type of god when Hiroshima detonated; one who’s logic we feel must be served, respected and prioritised.
The Culture of the Zombie Economy. This scientific vacuum created by Hiroshima as
pointed out by Serres (LaTour 87) is contextualised into economics when considering a quote from American investor Warren Buffet, who described 2008’s economics as a financial weapon
of mass destruction (Chang 2010, 30). A fear of economics, reaching similar proportions to that
"We knew the world would not be the same. Few people laughed, few people cried, most people were 8
silent. I remembered the line from the Hindu scripture, the Bhagavad-Gita. Vishnu is trying to persuade the Prince that he should do his duty and to impress him takes on his multi-armed form and says, 'Now I am become Death, the destroyer of worlds.' I suppose we all thought that, one way or another.” Dr Robert Oppenheimer (Plenilune Pictures)
of nuclear weaponry, led to a scientific predominance in the “ideoscape” (ideoscape being the collective, globalised mind) which then out of an interdependency influenced culture (Appadurai 11; Priceto 124) , then expanded upon in Chang’s economic texts (Chang 2007, 200; Chang 9
2010, 123) and in Mendoza’s chapter; Creating the Culture that Invites Austerity (86). There are fascinating examples of economic cultural strategy throughout history. For instance, historians agree that Abraham Lincoln’s abolishment of slavery in 1862 was more a cultural strategy to cap-ture minds into winning the war: “Disagreement over trade policy, in fact, was at least as impor-tant as, and possibly more imporimpor-tant than slavery in bring about the Civil War” (Chang 2007, 54), as tax ideology is significantly less enticing to die for.
Either directly or indirectly influenced, the catalyst to supporting economic policy is emo-tion, a property of culture in the humanities not the sciences, meanwhile: “economics morally transcends the individual” (LaTour 204; Chang 2007, 201). Controlling a humanities vacuum on the other hand is difficult as it is fuelled by a pragmatic type of cause, conceived out of challeng-ing a scientific vacuum. Emily Apter’s The Translation Zone commentated on a humanities vacu-um after 9/11, when a lack of western cultural awareness in the Middle East was realised and ma-jor efforts were made to pool those talents (2). Consequently expressions of humanities also need science to actually exist; weather it’s the distribution of literature, a televised speech or in ex-treme cases an act of terrorism. Contrariwise, some sciences need the creative pragmatism gener-ated by the humanities reacting to such vacuums in the first place. For instance, nuclear weapons and their universally acknowledged depravity, with capitalism following a similar distinction de-spite its potential to benefit mankind (Chang 2010, 253). Economically, both sciences and the
Edouard Glissant outlined a theory of interdependence between all actions and reactions (Priceto 124); 9
the famous chaos theory being a similar example. In tandem, other globalisation theorists, such as Ap-padurai, closed in on categorising that interdependence via the use of “scapes”; ethnoscape, technoscape, finanscape, mediascape and ideoscape (11). The theory here, is that if you infect a financescape with zom-bie economics, all other preceding scapes will also be affected with zomzom-bie-isms out of interdependency.
humanities are completely interdependent. However, letting scientific tools completely manage something outside of its realm diminishes our statuses as humans. Management models, as will be shown in section two, partly facilitate that covert regimentation.
If total subservience is allowed to come into existence we could depart one notion of hu-manism and become post-human zombies out of fear and compliance; lacking in the right type of pragmatism, creativity and questioning that the sciences need to govern effectively. In tandem, Serres notes that “Culture, whose job it was too slowly direct these archaisms, risks being de-stroyed by a science stripped of this function” (LaTour 86). Extreme oppression of humanities economic extensions (welfare states) (Hall 25; Stiglitz 2012, 156) leads to “precarity”, a mass form of social instability posited in Isabella Lorey’s The State of Insecurity (2015): “a nightmare, as a loss of all security, all orientation, all order” (Lorey 1). Nevertheless, the 1%’s logic acts on scientific principles such as economics to best control the enormous scale of their power, some-thing the 99% has not experienced.
If Hiroshima created a vacuum that recruits the talent minds of the world towards science out of fear and compliance, then the zombie economy and its control of culture will grow in effi-ciency. Destroying our humanities extensions (Hall 25) in the form of welfare state (Stiglitz 2012, 158) should create a similar protest type vacuum in favour of the humanities. However, as sup-ported by Mendoza, the zombie economies talented minds have disguised this arching symptom (88) and in turn limited our capability to “grasp the scope of this emergency” (Enter Shikari) , 10
supported by Stiglitz who states:
“Don't be fooled by it's simplicity. There was never a broadcast made of such urgency. Because at no 10
time before us, did we grasp the scope of this emergency” (Enter Shikari) Enter Shikari is an experimental hip-hop/metal/electronic band. Section 3 discusses rebellious and experimental types of music, with the artists for which perfectly exemplifying precarity in their lyrics. There are several other lyrical objects from these types of artists spread sporadically throughout the paper.
Citizens can’t make informed decisions as voters if they don't have access to the requisite information. But if the media are biased, they won't get information that is bal-anced. And even if the media were balanced, citizens know that the information that the government discloses to the media may not be (Stiglitz 2012, 160)
In light of this disillusionment, whilst still being a vacuum, the zombie economy has con-vinced its applicants that aspects of destruction are in fact evolution and therefore entirely neces-sary; a zombies survivability. Without a direct and mainstream resonance to inform precarious masses of this unnecessary vacuum (neoliberalisation of the welfare state and cultural hegemony) the right type of anger and pragmatic emotions embodied in a humanities vacuum has become (in reference to Lorey’s work) a precarious emotive; unsure how to react, develop responses and move forward:
“If we fail to understand precarization, then we fail to understand neither the poli-tics nor the economy of present…fear of what is not calculable marks the techniques of governing and subjectivation, merging into an inordinate culture of measuring the im-measurable” (Lorey 1-2).
The zombie economy sees the precarious and its experimental culture as something to be consumed for its own benefit, not encouraged to develop further. It capitalises upon the fear built from within the zombie economies vacuum, coining it as a competitive market value, making people work harder and longer towards a goal of repaying debts that aren't actually theirs. To that end, highly specific, yet wide spread aspects of potential innovation has been streamlined into the
commodity of risk profiteering, an exceptionally efficient method of evaporating challengers against the status quo.
Complicating matters further is the fact that people are willing to embrace the zombie economy that is in turn trying to consume their value and defecate debt (Mendoza 21). Boltanski and Chiapello in The New Spirit of Capitalism (2005) investigate this willingness further, and of-fer an “explanation for our continuing, expanding, increasingly global engagement with a system that exploits and damages us, which is due to our absorption of habits and behaviours founded on an ethos developed ‘outside’ capitalism” (Land & Taylor 204).
Land & Taylor take this idea further, and posit that we are currently at a fourth spirit of capitalism exemplified perfectly by today’s Californian liberal techie culture (204) . Here, life 11
and work blur together, idealising companies built on something resembling dedicated and flexi-ble entrepreneurs rather than regimented employees. If work and life is becoming one, then the fear established by the precariousness of the zombie economy further catalyses its own apparatus of consumption: those desperately seeking a life stability, which is now attached to work, are rarely rewarded with it. The 2008 Great Recession proved this wide spread fallacy with astonish-ing effectiveness. However, Boltanski and Chiapello write that our commitment to capitalism (and therefore the zombie economy) is formed from something “outside of capitalism”; that being the enjoyment of risk (Land & Taylor 204) and therefore the enjoyment of precarity.
The enjoyment of precarity is, in my opinion, drawn from a fear of knowing exactly where you will be career-wise 40 years down the line. Having your entire work/life planned out
“Boltanski and Chiapello’s first spirit is characterized by the bourgeois entrepreneur and his/her bour
11
-geois values, while the second is recognizable by the figure of the bureaucratic manager, embodying the values associated with large-scale, rational organization and management by objectives…The third spirit – the ‘new spirit of capitalism’ that they focus on in their book – sought to appeal to the criticisms of the students of May 1968 by reimagining capitalism in terms of excitement, stimulation and unalienated cre-ativity, albeit at the cost of ‘security’, which was associated with the boring and safe world of bureaucrat-ic, grey-flannel-suited managers from the 1950s” (Land & Taylor 203)
before you is loosing its appeal. Looking back to Stiglitz’s quote: “the plight of today’s twenty-year-olds. Instead of starting a new life, fresh with enthusiasm and hope, many of them confront a world of anxiety and fear [precarity]” (Stiglitz 2012, 332), highlights a paradox. Having left the sheltered security of higher education, they become survivors, not yet consumed by the zombie economy and swayed into ‘permanent’ jobs with the luxurious ‘illusion of security’ (Virno 36 ). 12
These young people now have to adapt to survive within the zombie economy, to enhance their own competitiveness against their peers. Specifically, the young people who can creatively ma-nipulate precarity in their favour could personify a fifth spirit of capitalism.
Precarity and the illusion of security transcends all class systems, even the elites as they anxiously horde wealth from everyone else who is seeking it (Lorey 9). It is a virus (Lorey 51), exceptionally thorough in transmission. While an individual is indeed precarious, that infection is never limited to that specific body. The precarious environment surrounding the individual can be manipulated just as effectively. Judith Butler, the original founder of the precarious discourse writes in Precarious Lives: “We are undone by each other” (Butler 23). This is where we must separate the precarious and the survivors. Once a precariate manipulates their inherently precari-ous situation, they become survivors; an embodiment of the fifth spirit of capitalism.
Section 1: Conclusion. Now it has been established that the zombie economy creates its
own innovational target, the survivor, this thesis will now hone in on the results drawn from the cultural analysis of zombie economics to begin facilitating a pragmatic solution. In order to create this visualisation of reality, it is important to firstly summarise what has been accomplished in this section.
We will revisit more of Virno’s thoughts from A Grammar of the Multitude (2009) in detail in section 12
Primarily, we have confirmed that the zombie economy is not limited to economics. It is embodied and reinforced by many other institutions in the media, as well as politics and educa-tion. There is more a culture of zombie-nomics, conjured up by a fearful fascination for the logic of scientific predominance. For example, performing as a master rather than a tool, technology lures people to queue around the block for Apple products as though they were Beatle’s tickets (Lowensohn & Kerstetter) . Obsessive consumerism as such, is merely a symptom of zombie 13
economics fuelling its own technocratic favourability.
Chang insists that economic policies formulate the cultures that we live in (Chang 2007, 200). Those scientific prescriptions then address the management procedures for culturally entan-gled institutions within a society (Lorey 2; Stiglitz 2012, 156). Therefore, it can be asserted that the zombie economy has grown into a zombie apparatus, in regards to a Foucauldian perspective, which entraps a cultural mindset or discipline into fuelling its own cause with no sympathies for the other (Foucault 194).
The problem also creates a solution; however, the solution faces a juncture. As a matter of perspective, when presented with precariousness, the subject could pragmatically embrace its in-stability as a means of personal development. Such as taking advantage of short term contracts to become interdisciplinary, to travel, to meet other similar minded precariates, to experiment and therefore evolve as means of survival. If one is precarious, then the environment is also as such, and in a better place to be manipulated to improve the precariates prospects. A counter contin-gency would be a subject clinging to illusions of security, partly exemplified by the “Boomerang Generation” (Stiglitz 2012, 18); long term contracts, mal-employment and rejecting any notion 14
One wonders if this fascination will eventually turn into a human right, that the restriction of technology 13
will become an ethical issue and a basic human right, similar to water. Return to the stability of home after high education instead of elsewhere. 14
of socio-professional mobility. Conclusively, this section has constructed an image in my mind resembling the model bellow, which will be added to as this research progresses per section. For now, this image defines the cultural separation between the zombie cognitive and survivor cogni-tive, economically known as a “dual economy” (Stiglitz 2012, 362). The section thereafter, lends scope to potential power of simple imagery, such as this, in the right context.
Section 2: Visual Management Models: Potential Tools for Survivability
Before continuing the cultural analysis of a dual economy in the zombie context, this the-sis must now tangent briefly away from zombie economics to outline potential tools for surviv-ability. If survivability is the fifth spirit of capitalism, then it certainly worth scrutinising the managerial tools that facilitate that type of capitalism; a method used by Boltanski and Chiapello to outline the first, second and third spirits in The New Spirit of Capitalism (2009) . Moreover, 15
this has been done to provide a worthwhile experimental conclusion that umbrella’s the cries for interdisciplinary solutions thematically layered throughout this thesis. Using the same concepts shown in the first section, visualised management models now face analysis as the modern tools that agent the undead, neoliberal utopia discussed in section one.
To that end, Serres stated in an interview at Stanford University, that the humanities might be the next “dead” idea (Haven). Decolonial philosopher Walter Mingolo in The Darker
Sides of Wester Modernity, theorises what ‘dead’ and ‘deadly ideas’ actually are from a
Argentin-ian perspective. The context of his research posits a global vacuum towards the west in terms of knowledge creation, which Mingolo names “zero-point epistemology” (102). This point, as well as regulating, also produces ideas that invades developing nations of the other, with little consid-eration for any alternative preferences. These, he calls, are “dead” and “deadly ideas”, described as follows:
“Via an unprecedented analysis of management texts which influenced the thinking of employers and 15
contributed to reorganization of companies over the last decades, the authors trace the contours of a new spirit of capitalism. From the middle of the 1970s onwards, capitalism abandoned the hierarchical Fordist work structure and developed a new network-based form of organization which was founded on employee initiative and relative work autonomy, but at the cost of material and psychological security” (Boltanski and Chiapello, xi)
A dead idea is an idea whose origins have been betrayed, one that has deviated from its archetype and thus no longer has any roots in its original cultural plasma. In con-trast, a deadly idea is an idea that has lost both its identity and cultural value having been cut of its roots that are left in their original cultural universe (Mingolo 102)
Mingolo’s quotation suggests that the ‘cultural plasma’ for the humanities has deviated. The humanities ‘cultural plasma’ is to me, the development of thought, creation, art, critique, analysis and aspects that bring to realisation a specific way to engage life with. Banishing such profound objects to death, however, cannot be so simple in reality. Archives, museums, galleries and lectures exist and prevent that destruction. Although, referencing Mingolo’s thoughts detailed above, there is very little descriptive boundary to stop something transforming into a deadly, zombie-nomic idea.
Some ‘deadly ideas’ that have done this, for instance, could be western economics which was originally a philosophy, not a science, born out of the humanities in ancient Greece and is now praised for its moral transcendence. Economists are in a better position to make difficult de-cisions over society because of their fields’ scientific binary and lack of humanism that, given a chance, may complicate a decision (LaTour 204). Mainstream economics hegemonic implemen-tation that brought about globalisation highlights Mingolo’s loss of “identity and cultural value” (102). Its implementation opposes Serres prescription for survivability: “there is nothing weaker than a global system that becomes unitary. When there is only one law, it means sudden death. The individual lives much better when he becomes numerous: the same with societies or with existence in general” (Serres 14). Adam Smith, the Scottish father of free-market economics invented a system poised from his experiences specifically in the European Enlightenment. This school of European economics was then transferred globally as the system to manage system,
with no functioning alternative available today, bringing into effect “one law” (Chang 2010, 253; Serres 14).
Paradoxically, the humanities that nurtured economics at birth may have to evolve to stay pertinent within it and its utter predominance (Grossberg 1; Haven). In my opinion, the recently popular idea of management models may be an opacity of that very demand; businesses method for facilitating philosophy, culture and creativity in the workplace. Understanding and creating them is an artistic process, also philosophical in reasoning, yet their creation belongs more to the MBA’s and not the MA’s. The concept is displayed via simple, yet occasionally surreal images around offices, presented in meetings and used to encompass the ideology behind experimental project management (A case study and example of the visualised model “Lean Manufacturing” is present towards the end of this section). Normally, the induction of management models takes place when the complexity around a problem becomes difficult to communicate efficiently. In theorising survivability via a management model, I hope to maintain that clarity. For instance, take into consideration this quote from a management article covering the creation of future mod-els as such:
The whole idea of a management model is to provide a condensed version of
real-ity - one by which managing complexreal-ity is facilitated. The search for the one true model
is thus a futile quest since it does not exist [a utopia]. As the famous quality-guru Dem-ing said: “Every theorem is true in its own world. The question is, which world are we in?” (Eskildsen et al. 8)
Therefore, it is this papers duty to validate and analyse the object of management models coping with an undead utopia, its ‘shifting plasma’: “the nightmare to which we are slowly
marching” (Stiglitz 2012, 362). As they are merely a tool (explained later), their function can be rearranged to benefit survivability.
Visual Management Models: Facilitators of Zombie-ism. When a team of engineers,
managers, accountants, marketers and administrators, all from different cultural backgrounds and schools of thought view a management model, they see a universally agreed direction to progress upon despite the complexity of their inevitable preferences. Metaphors in Globalization provides an insight into how this is possible: “a process of creative comparisons or tropes of resemblance between different objects, contexts and/or experiences” (Kornprobst et al. 4) takes place within each individual mind upon viewing such models. Panning across the group of professionals, it can be assured that they have all created a goal remarkably different from the next, yet amazingly, they move forward together as if the thought is unanimous. It is because of these different inter-nal visualisations of perfection, coupled with unanimous agreement that makes the possibility of a utopia feel tangible. However, that unanimous imagery can become reflective of the zombie.
Prepositions of the management model as a metaphor for an undead, utopia is the desire for change: “to have a meaningful life in the minds of men, such a utopia must start with the is-sue of man-made suffering” (Radhakrishnan 322). In the context of tripartite metaphors as put forward in Metaphors of Globalization, a management model falls initially into the category of ‘mutiny’ (Kornprobst et al. 11) because of its mission to change an old, unsustainable system: “… the issue of man-made suffering” (Radhakrishnan 322). In the zombie economy, the most recent mutinies (post-2008) have replaced real innovation with undead ideas (Stiglitz 2015; Chang 2010, 30; LaTour 87).
“…No matter what the specific motivation may be, the overriding theme is organisational change” (Eskildsen et al. 8). What is changing upon implementation of a management model is
the hierarchy of a dysfunctional past that might have facilitated destruction or a system that has become too archaic to be relevant. However, there are further dimensions to this metaphor apart from ‘mutiny’ that are relevant to the object. These other parallels are intriguingly depicted in the form of a management model within Metaphors of Globalisation, further reinforcing the ethos of universality amongst the object:
(Kornprobst et al. 12)
Management models whilst being mutinies are initially built within the ‘mirror’ confine: “the use of management models as a means to identify opportunities for improvement and change within organisation is called organisational self-assessment” (Eskildsen et al. 5) Self-assessment being the process of scrutinising your current state, a reflection of one’s own organisational prob-lematics. Mendoza’s commentary on the corruption of media outlets in the previous chapter has distorted this option of self reflection (88-106). Furthermore, these models also fall into the cate-gory of ‘magician’. “The magician is the agent capable of effecting such a transformation” (Ko-rnprobst et al. 9), which is society: “- believing in the collective - voluntarily subject[ing] them-selves to those distorted conditions of society (Lorey 4). Overall, management models shift throughout the universe depicted in Kornprobst’s visualisation. If the object of management
mod-els can locate themselves within all aspects of the tripartite, then it is a very powerful metaphor, capable of being accepted and created on many differentiating terms.
However: “they [management models] differ also from common tools in that they are not an object or “a thing” that can be observed or measured. The “tool” only comes “alive” once a person starts using the model” (Eskildsen et al. 8). Whilst the metaphor is transferable and di-gestible between conflictual minds, there has to be a substantial motivation for a person to con-jure a specific set of managerial practices into reality. There is a real sacrifice of the self when a commitment to another process begins as it is not your own thoughts but the guidance of some-thing else. Emphasis on the metaphor certainly assists the digestion as it allows the painting of your own specific notion. That notion, on the other hand, has a preconceived general direction that in turn compliments similar ideas also progressing in that direction; like branches of a tree, interlinking, supporting, and moving forward together.
Consensually advocating for this sacrifice may be part of a larger sociological phenomena in observing the merger between work and life in the zombie apparatus: “This shift has meant two things for what work feels like in offices, shops and factories across the country: an upsurge in the sort of jobs that use our emotions instead of our bodies” (Biggs; Lorey 27). To that end, management models are perhaps a sub-cognitive and emotional counteraction to the work/emo-tions merger, also discussed in Isabel Lorey’s notion of “precarity” in The State of Insecurity:
…workers, imaginary self-relations of this kind mean that one’s own body is imagined as the property of the self; it is ones own body that has to be sold as labour power…in order to reduce precariousness (Lorey 27-28)
Uncertainty as such, is only cured by stability. So perhaps, when a team of professionals engage with a management model that is, according to business texts: “a stable theoretical framework that can be used to observe, create and asses a real life organisational ‘situation’ in order to make the desired (future) improvements” (Eskildsen et al. 4) that cure to embodied pre-carity becomes available in the workplace. If Lorey’s thoughts are accurate in saying that precari-ty predominates every modern notion and action then managerial visualisations merely need to present the hope of stability, an aspect to the modern utopia, to ignite a motivated following. The direction of this following, however, could be geared towards survivability; assisting precarious minds to escape zombie-ism.
Drawing particular attention to the word tool for discussions surrounding a management model (Eskildsen et al. 8) and juxtaposing this against the shift of labor from the hands to the mind (Biggs; Lorey 1-2), it can be posited that this ‘tool’ engages the service sector in a highly specific cognitive area; management models are a tool for the mind when facing the complexity of precariousness. As the demands of the zombie economy (displayed in the previous section) entrench people into precarity, models as tools should be readily embraced to little opposition, appeasing against harshening emotional instability. However, this is not the case:
When talking about management models it is important to remember that they are
not a miracle cure in the sense that application will guarantee organisational success.
Applying a management model is hard work that requires dedication, persistency and
courage but if these three prerequisites are present the desired changes are possible
With this problematic and returning to the thoughts of Serres and Grossberg who call for an evolutionary type of art and culture if it is to survive, perhaps management models are the sig-nature to each prescription. A combination of art with management could further ease a manager-ial induction whilst assisting artistic and cultural studies attempting to avoid a “death” of irrele-vance in the zombie apparatus (Grossberg 1; Haven). For instance, management model ideology is philosophical, a guide to life in a sense, but it also provides “a condensed version of reality - one by which managing complexity is facilitated” (Eskildsen et al. 8). It allows the contemplation contingencies, paradoxes and contradictions around the future of a new idea, to which Serres asks: “What good is philosophy if it doesn't give birth to the world of the future?” (LaTour 79). Moreover, the engagement is visual and thus potentially exploitable by artists who enjoy provid-ing the journey of discovery. Western cities have already laboriously commanded themselves through simple imagery of the management model kind; informing citizens where to exit in case of emergency, where to drive and park a car (Zizek). In theory, strengthening the visual aesthetics of these repetitive public images may well transcend into stimulating the spirituality of higher consciousness . Whether that is good or bad given circumstance, the invigoration of the higher 16
consciousness can only aid the aforementioned philosophy taking place, nourishing the creativity and optimism amongst survivability. In counterpart, with arching themes such as precarity taking place, radical and rebellious parallels against that type of reality is bound to take place in some form eventually. If western people are as precarious as Lorey notes (Lorey 1), then implementa-tions of the kind just explained could extend to naimplementa-tions, not just businesses as leaders in the US have believed in the past. “If it’s good for General Motors, it’s good for the US” (Chang 2010,
There is a similar trend in the Video Games industry. Compromising visual emphasis, ‘Indie Games’ 16
have pioneered in gameplay design, with nostalgic - HD - surreal 80’s inspired graphics. This section of the industry prides itself on making innovative games that attempt to place the player into a state of higher consciousness that is required solve the problem (hohokum).
190). It isn’t too difficult to imagine a political party presenting, instead of a manifesto, a national goal or ideology encapsulated in a visualised management model similar to this (Schume):
Worse methods for political endorsement have already happened (Hyde) : 17
Footnote on next page. 17
A Case Study: Lean Manufacturing. Lean manufacturing, partially depicted in the management
model above, is an incredible metaphor for globalisation. The principles of Japanese style man-agement have readily infiltrated many industries as an effective tool to combat the traditionally bureaucratic and structured industries of the west; an overly inherited epitome from the neoliberal induction of the 1970’s and ‘Fordism’ (Hall 93; Womack 3). The Silicon Valley and its liberal18
-ist-techie culture for instance have pioneered an American digest of fundamental Japanese man-agement. Open offices, horizontal management and collaborative communication being the buzz elements of a successful modern innovation are in fact traceable back to the Toyota Production System (TPS) from 1960’s Japan (Womack 3). Once TPS was academically absorbed in the west, its influence spread to aspiring foreign minds that were previously unable to access such inspira-tion. TPS is now known as Lean Manufacturing, since MIT academic James Womack American-ized its ideas in 1991.
The ideas of the Japanese were not compatible with a foreign audience until their opacity was rudimentarily inhaled from the other and exhaled as the self, an embodiment of multicultural coding (Rosello 313). As the ideas of conscious creative, or ‘radical’ change are instinctually met with criticism and rejection (Holt 294; Canavan 3), disguising creative change as an administra-tive method may covertly manipulate a bureaucratic culture into the desired result via its own systems, i.e. management models. My model of survivability, developed further after this section, defeats zombie-ism at its own game. With this method, the target audience achieves an effective
Fordism is a management model, then political ideology, built by Henry Ford. As stated in the oxford 18
dictionary defining the term, It upholds ideals of mass production for mass consumption.
17 Labour’s 2015 election campaign for the UK Government attempted many bold strategies to survive.
Ed Miliband, pictured above, had his pledges chiseled into lime stone; a supposed reflection of solidarity, then ridiculed by his own party. He also allowed for interviews with famous ‘vloggers’ (comedians, beau-ticians and pop acts) – certainly the first UK politician to really engage with the online community. More interestingly, he embraced an internet ‘Fan-Dom’ amongst teenagers in the UK. Similar to that in pop cul-ture, his face would be superimposed onto the bodies of boxers, superhero’s and celebrities, with young girls in particular tweeting about their crush on the party leader. (Hyde)
state of rudimentariness to the changes (Rosello 313), allowing their disposition to be adhered to with a limited repulsion.
If metaphors in the context of globalisation “provide (new) vocabularies that make politi-cal and social change intelligible” (Kornprobst et al. 2), then lean manufacturing, and with it management models overall, are certainly a pragmatic embodiment. An “established metaphor [that] can and may have in turn a self-reinforcing effect, shaping not only how to perceive the world but also how we act and react to it.” (Kornprobst et al. 2).
Lean manufacturing has accomplished self-reinforcement in the metaphor context to ex-ceptional standards. Despite being initially created to manage automobile production, its concepts have infiltrated entire enterprises, formulating corporate cultures for behemoth organisations such as Rolls-Royce, Nike and Intel (Hanna). Referring back to the earlier imagery, notice at the ‘heart’ of the wheel is an allocation of metaphors deemed to be ‘wasteful’. These are ‘Transport, Inventory, Motion, Waiting, Over-Processing, Overproduction and Defects’. The powerful metaphor in the etymology of the term ‘waste’ is so because it can be assigned to whatever is deemed appropriate by an individual. For instance, transport between cities must be quicker as that excess time is waste for the economy, or transporting yourself between a laptop to a printer is wasteful for the progress of your workload. Another metaphor is conveyed via the interlocking circle, known in Lean schools of thought as ‘continuous improvement’: if your new system doesn't interlock or guarantee automatic replenishment via organisational bodies - much like a Foucauldian apparatus (Foucault 194) - then it isn't worth implementing. The fact that these words are at the centre of the image is not a coincidence, taking the etymology of ‘Lean’; lack of
excess, and then comparing it with the excessive consumption idealised in post ford-ism, the
Section 2: Conclusion. “Some metaphors fall by the wayside” (Kornprobst et al. 2), as
proven with Fordism, “while others become so deeply entrenched and taken for granted, that their metaphorical status is forgotten” (Kornprobst et al. 2; Womack 3). In the Oxford Dictionary, eco-nomics was initially a metaphorical reference to household management in ancient Greece, now imbedded as an irrevocable epistemology to manage life and its quality. Therefore, if manage-ment models remain solely a product of scientific schools of thought, who:
...ever more forcefully, recruits the best intellects, the most efficient technical and financial means. As a result science finds itself in a dominant position, at the top of the heap, as we say, single-handedly, preparing the future and in a position to occupy more and more territory. Powerful and isolated, it runs - or could run and make others run grave risks. Why? Because it knows nothing about culture. As Aesop said about language, sci-ence has become by far the best and perhaps the worst side of things....hsci-enceforth we are in danger because culture, whose job it was too slowly direct these archaisms, risks being destroyed by a science stripped of this function (LaTour 86)
Preconditions of precarity, work/life mergers and universal metaphorical resonance, then, are still lacking the correct appealing texture to meet the demands of the modern human subject without friction. With this, I would like to return to the earlier point that management models are of the MBA’s and not the MA’s, and that interdisciplinary thought could forge evolutionary types of survivability via the object. Serres reinforces this prognosis, in saying that when disciplines are segregated, they reinvent only themselves rather than help each other:
Even the analytical school is still and endlessly refining questions already re-solved or asked in the eighteenth century in the French-Language texts or in the Middle Ages in universities using Latin or Greek antiquity in the sophist schools. When philoso-phy is trapped in academia it doesn’t move much. What continues perennially is the insti-tution whose function remains the reproduction of obedient young people. One could say that it imposes a method (LaTour 45)
This ‘method’, also a Foucauldian apparatus (Foucault 194), entraps different schools of thought to ridicule each other for lack of relevance to each other, thereby imposing further segre-gation. They critique the opposition, but rarely merge. Perhaps this is the reason why manage-ment models fail to resonate without enforcemanage-ment upon humans despite the unprecedented de-mand for exactly that type of cognitive evolutionary progress. The humanities are not yet a dead specialism (Haven). In fact, it is in a far better place to manage, inspire and lead than ever before with even mainstream capitalist publications such as The Economist bellowing out for that type of creativity now almost void in enterprise:
The only way to become a real thought leader is to ignore all this noise and listen to a few great thinkers. You will learn far more about leadership from reading Thucy-dides’s hymn to Pericles than you will from a thousand leadership experts. You will learn far more about doing business in China from reading Confucius than by listening to culture consultants (Ryder)
This thesis will take steps to create a management model that metaphors the humanities in the context of survivability (with the conclusive elements of each section visualised accordingly); an interdisciplinary visualisation consisting of economic theory, philosophy and cultural analysis. Current management models are used to facilitate universal conformity to one particular ideal, usually that of profitability. The model built here will metaphor survivability, rather than zombie-ism, with the following section now adding to the creation.
