New edition of this major work examining the development of neoliberalism In this major work
sociologists Luc Boltanski and Eve Chiapello go to the heart of the changes in contemporary
capitalism. Via an unprecedented analysis of the latest management texts that have formed the
thinking of employers in their reorganization of business the authors trace the contours of a
new spirit of capitalism. They argue that from the middle of the 1970s onwards capitalism
abandoned the hierarchical Fordist work structure and developed a new network-based form of
organization that was founded on employee initiative and autonomy in the workplace-a freedom
that came at the cost of material and psychological security. The authors connect this new
spirit with the children of the libertarian and romantic currents of the late 1960s (as
epitomised by dressed-down cool capitalists such as Bill Gates and Ben and Jerry) arguing that
they practice a more successful and subtle-form of exploitation. Now a classic work charting
the sociological structure of neoliberalism Boltanski and Chiapello show how the new spirit
triumphed thanks to a remarkable recuperation of the left's critique of the alienation of
everyday life that simultaneously undermined their social critique. In this new edition the
two author reflect on the reception of the book and the debates it has stimulated.
