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Living on the Edge of Burnout: Defamiliarizing Neoliberalism Through Cyberpunk

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Living on the Edge of Burnout: Defamiliarizing Neoliberalism Through Cyberpunk Living on the Edge of Burnout: Defamiliarizing Neoliberalism Through Cyberpunk Science Fiction Caroline Alphin Dissertation submitted to the faculty of the Virginia Polytechnic Institute and State University in partial fulfillment of the requirements of the degree of Doctor of Philosophy In ASPECT: The Alliance of Social, Political, Ethical, and Cultural Thought François Debrix, Chair Mauro Caraccioli Rebecca Hester Phil Olson Blacksburg, VA Keywords: Neoliberalism; Cyberpunk; Science Fiction; Intensity; Resilience; Competition; Logic of Intensity; Biohacker; Political Theory; Genre Studies; Critical Theory; Biopolitics; Necropolitics; Fitness Tracker; Self-Quantification; Film Studies; Cyborg Copyright 2019 Living on the Edge of Burnout: Defamiliarizing Neoliberalism Through Cyberpunk Science Fiction Caroline Alphin ACADEMIC ABSTRACT A dominant trend in cyberpunk scholarship draws from Fredric Jameson’s diagnosis of postmodernism as the logic of late capitalism, using Jameson’s spatial pastiche, schizophrenic temporality, and waning of affect, along with Jameson’s characterization of Baudrillard’s simulacrum to interpret postmodern cultural artifacts. For many cultural critics, the city of cyberpunk is thoroughly postmodern because parallels can be drawn between the cyberpunk city and the postmodern condition. However, very little work has considered the ways in which cyberpunk can defamiliarize the necro-spatial and necro- temporal logic of neoliberalism. This project moves away from more traditional disciplinary aesthetic methods of analyzing power and urban systems, such as interpretation and representation. And, it problematizes the biopolitical present in three different ways. First, by weaving in and out of an analysis of the narratives, discourses, and spatio-temporalities of cyberpunk and neoliberalism, I seek to produce epistemological interferences within these genres/disciplines, and thus, to disrupt the conceptual and lived biopolitical status-quo of late-capitalism. The goal is to open the door for discomfort with and a critical awareness of the necrotic conditions of competition by highlighting the fictive nature of neoliberalism. Second, this study problematizes accelerationism as a viable alternative to leftist politics and suggests in the end that accelerationism is a form of neoliberal resilience. It does this through an analysis of the biohacker that reframes this subject in terms of accelerationism and the logic of intensity. I argue that the biohacker is the accelerationist subject Alex Williams and Nick Srnicek advocate for in their “Accelerationist Manifesto,” suggesting that this accelerationist subject is, in the end, a neoliberal subject that fits easily within the conditions of competition. This study argues that the biohacker in its numerous forms reflects an underlying pure neoliberalism at work within accelerationism and its neoliberal governmentalities. I suggest that far from being an alternative to leftist politics, accelerationism may further the goals of neoliberalism in its desire to accelerate to a purified market space. And, finally, this study works towards offering a biopolitics that theorizes death in terms of ordinariness and suggests that biopolitics is still a useful analytic within neoliberalism. In other words, Foucault’s biopolitics can do more than theorize a genealogy of biological racism and genocide. Rather than advocate for moving beyond biopolitics, this study argues instead that neoliberal biopolitics can still be understood in terms of Foucault’s analytic, and that perhaps, we need to disentangle Foucault’s work from Achille Mbembe’s “Necropolitics.” Living on the Edge of Burnout: Defamiliarizing Neoliberalism Through Cyberpunk Science Fiction GENERAL AUDIENCE ABSTRACT A dominant trend in cyberpunk scholarship draws from Fredric Jameson’s diagnosis of postmodernism as the logic of late capitalism, using Jameson’s spatial pastiche, schizophrenic temporality, and waning of affect, along with Jameson’s characterization of Baudrillard’s simulacrum to interpret postmodern cultural artifacts. For many cultural critics, the city of cyberpunk is thoroughly postmodern because parallels can be drawn between the cyberpunk city and the postmodern condition. However, very little work has considered the ways in which cyberpunk can defamiliarize the necro-spatial and necro- temporal logic of neoliberalism. This project moves away from more traditional disciplinary aesthetic methods of analyzing power and urban systems, such as interpretation and representation. It problematizes the biopolitical present in three different ways. First, by weaving in and out of an analysis of the narratives, discourses, and spatio-temporalities of cyberpunk and neoliberalism, I seek to produce epistemological interferences within these genres/disciplines, and thus, to disrupt the conceptual and lived biopolitical status-quo of late-capitalism. Second, this study problematizes accelerationism as a viable alternative to leftist politics and suggests in the end that accelerationism is a form of neoliberal resilience. And, finally, this study works towards offering a biopolitics that theorizes death in terms of ordinariness and suggests that biopolitics is still a useful analytic within neoliberalism. Methodologically, the project utilizes an interdisciplinary approach, pulling from political theory, genre studies, discourse analysis, and digital ethnographic research. Professionals and scholars interested in contesting neoliberalism will benefit from this study as it offers ways to problematize neoliberalism’s reality construction. To my life-partner. iv Acknowledgements Throughout my time in the ASPECT program I have received support from family, mentors, and friends. To Michael Zarella, my husband, thank you for pushing me to audit a class that made this all possible. Your love, patience, support, intelligence, and respect were all integral in helping me reach the end. I would like to thank François Debrix, my chair, mentor, and friend, for his unwavering support and invaluable feedback throughout my time in the ASPECT program. I have also been fortunate to have worked with Mauro Caraccioli, Rebecca Hester, and Phil Olson. Their comments, criticisms, and suggestions are much appreciated. I am also grateful to my friends in ASPECT who have been there for me throughout this process, including Mary Ryan, Shelby Ward, Mario Khreiche, Leigh McKagen, and Tim Filbert. And, finally, thank you to my parents and my brother. I love you. v Contents Introduction. Introduction: Living on the Edge of Burnout 1. Introduction…………………………………………………………………………1 2. Biopower, Necropower, and Cyberpunk……………………………………………7 3. The Politics of Cyberpunk………………………………………………………….14 4. Postmodern Readings of Cyberpunk……………………………………………….18 5. A Bit on Methodology……………………………………………………………...27 6. Aims and Chapters………………………………………………………………….31 Chapter One. The Neoliberal Science Fictions of Cyberpunk 1. Introduction………………………………………………………………………….36 2. The Affirmative Speculations of Cyberpunk Science Fiction……………………….37 3. Amplification………………………………………………………………………...39 4. Cyborganization……………………………………………………………………...45 5. Denaturalizing the Conditions of Competition………………………………………51 6. Conclusion: The Ambivalent Politics of Cyberpunk………………………………...55 Chapter Two. Cyborg Neoliberalism: The Quantified-Self as Instrumentalized Self-Cultivation 1. Introduction………………………………………………………………………….60 2. An Analysis of Popular Techno Discourses…………………………………………67 3. Neoliberal Subjectivities in Online Fitbit Communities…………………………….77 4. Conclusion: The Desperation Haunting “Self-Cultivation”…………………………87 Chapter Three. Not a State of Exception: Weak State Killing as a Mode of Neoliberal Governmentality 1. Introduction…………………………………………………………………………90 2. Sovereignty, Biopower, Racism…………………………………………………….94 3. Is Necropolitics Really About Sovereign Power?.....................................................101 vi 4. The Spatio-Temporality of Neoliberalism………………………………………….106 5. Conclusion………………………………………………………………………….116 Chapter Four. Thinking the Biopolitical: Cyberpunk Necroscapes and Necro-temporality in Blade Runner 1. Introduction…………………………………………………………………………118 2. Schizophrenic Temporality and Blade Runner……………………………………..132 3. Necro-temporality and Blade Runner………………………………………………135 4. Spatial Pastiche and Blade Runner…………………………………………………138 5. The Cyberpunk City as a Necroscape………………………………………………140 6. Conclusion………………………………………………………………………….145 Chapter Five. Bulletproof Neoliberalism: Reframing Accelerationism and the Biohacker Within the Logic of Intensity and Resilience 1. Introduction………………………………………………………………………..147 2. An Analysis of Neoliberal Accelerationism………………………………………153 3. An Analysis of Biohacker Discourses…………………………………………….165 4. Conclusion: Parasites on the Body Capital?............................................................174 Chapter Six. Conclusion: Defamiliarizing Neoliberalism Through Cyberpunk Science Fiction 1. Conclusion…………………………………………………………………………177 Bibliography…………………………………………………………………………………..185 vii Introduction Living on the Edge of Burn Out 1. Introduction It is a paradox that killing certain populations is a positive condition of biopower.1 Biopower’s primary functions are to define life as an object of governmentality, subject stochastic events to calculability, and make a population live.2 And yet, it is also the case that these functions are tightly coupled with modes of state killing. Neoliberal governmentality3 has utilized
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