Understanding Neoliberal Agency: The British East India Company

Abstract

<p>Neoliberalism is not a philosophy, it is a strategy. To understand it we need to know what kind of agent naturally plays this strategy. The answer is that it is attractive for large businesses: in particular for corporations of a size sufficient to give them the political capacity to open up previously protected or independent realms of human interaction for commodified exploitation. A paradigm instance of such neoliberal agency can be found in the history of the British East India Company.</p>