Caring for Debts: How the Household Economy Exposes the Limits of Financialisation

Abstract

This article uses the United Kingdom as a case study to explore the limits of financialisation. It makes visible the increasingly intimate relationship between financialisation, indebtedness and social reproduction under the conditions of neoliberal austerity (Fraser, 2014). It does so by unpacking how the everyday experiences of indebtedness materialise among individuals, households and communities. Specifically, we investigate debt’s significance within the household economy by analysing the everyday talk within ‘debt threads’ from leading peer-to-peer forums (Stanley, 2014, Stanley et al., 2016). The evidence reveals how debt interferes with and disrupts the intimacies of life, and in doing so erodes its own moral economic claim as a priority obligation within the household economy. These are the limits of financialisation because if debts are not ‘cared for’ they are non-performing. And, non-performing loans – as it turns out – cause catastrophic failures in financialised global markets. This alone makes understanding the household economy relevant to why neoliberalism is failing.