Visions of the City: Utopianism, Power and Politics in Twentieth-Century Urbanism (review)

Africapitalism: The marketisation of philanthrocapitalism and neoliberalism in African entrepreneurial philanthropy

“…This frame's characteristics helps in understanding Africapitalism and how it is marketised . On the one hand, utopian neoliberalism centres on visionary and ideal assumptions about society (Pinder, 2013), whereas the more utilitarian version highlighting capitalist tendencies in marketing the benefits of philanthrocapitalism, the return-on-investments and profit maximisation (Carrick, 2018;Barkan, 2013). These two opposing discourses signal a conflict of interest/tension between utopianism (doing social/good/wellbeing) and utilitarianism principles used in marketing philanthropy - Langdridge (2006).…”

“…Another evolving marketisation strategy used in and for philanthrocapitalism purposes is neoliberal ideology (Pinder, 2013;Holt and Cameron, 2010). Given marketisation's emphasis on a sustained healthy economic state and a free market, it is no wonder that its strategies promote a deregulated, privatised and minimalistic state intervention economic system (Venugopal and Viswanathan, 2017;Duménil and Lévy, 2010), as an ideology.…”

“…Despite the apparent benefits, they have left a void in terms of 'how' they could be operationalised in the context of Africa and any justification for doing so. To ascertain the power of marketisation as a tool to enhance philanthrocapitalism, the authors examine additional critical discourses on philanthropy to evaluate their utopian, capitalist, marketisation and/or utilitarian frame(s) (Pinder, 2013;Ganti, 2014) to shed light on how these evolving ideological discourses shape/drive the marketisation of Africapitalism. Geertz (1973) argues that ideologies impactfully influence practices, experiences and their social construction (also see Dholakia's 2016 'marketing of inequality' concept) whereas Ricoeur (1991) emphasises on the social integration benefits of ideology [e.g., marketisation of philanthropy].…”

“…To investigate this lapse in a diverse continent, we draw on utopianism and neoliberalism frameworks partly because of the embedded 'good' they promise in such a context and how people depict their own and societal worldviews of their operationalisation (Dijk, 1998, p. 130) to shed light on the grey areas of not only 'how' philanthropy is marketised, managed, organised and theoretically developed (Saifer, 2021;Harrow et al, 2021) but additionally 'why' this may be so. This evolving state of philanthrocapitalism has even prompted the emergence of 'counterculture' discourses, leading to Sargent, 2010 proposition of common-sense view and the need to adopt a unifying utopian set of ideals that may socio-politically and economically benefit philanthrocapitalism and its framing around utopian marketisation ideology (Pinder, 2013). The state we are currently crystallises the conceptualisation of a western European and North American hegemonic discourse on utopian and neoliberal ideologies, which has caught scholars in a continuous loop (or spiral) of simultaneously attempting to integrate a shared identity and commonality of underpinning 'truths' regarding the benefits of marketing ideologisations on philanthropy, and by extension, philanthropicapitalism while implementation strategies and justification frameworks differ at best and lack in most cases.…”

The Aesthetics of Sand: Reclaiming Hong Kong’s Unsettled Grounds

“…Relatedly, some writers have argued that analysis of spatial practices has much to learn from anti-realist forms such as surrealism (Blencowe 2016), magical realism (Laws 2016), situationism (Pinder 2013), and spontaneous prose (Honeybun-Arnolda 2019). Formal experiments are especially important in expressing the experiences of colonised people, where the ground of reality has already been destroyed, demanding expressive forms that can articulate and heal the wounds of systematic racism and dispossession.…”