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Identity theft vulnerability

Neoliberal governance through crime construction

Vanderbilt University, USA

Under the rubric of neoliberalism, the governance of populations occurs through new technologies and techniques of social control. Contemporary neoliberal discourses of crime control, in particular, normalize conditions of individual insecurity and responsibility while diverting attention away from root causes of social problems. The phenomenon of identity theft offers a generative case study for theorizing the ramifications of neoliberalism as a mode of crime control. The field is marked by the production of consumer-citizen subjects, who embrace self-discipline to mitigate crime threats; the transformation of mundane criminal acts into national security threats; the development of flexible accumulation skills, on the part of identity thieves, to compensate for the decline in state support for social reproduction; and the maintenance of insecure information infrastructures, which simultaneously increase the profitability of industry and vulnerability of the public.

Key Words: governance • identity theft • neoliberalism • security • social control • technology

Theoretical Criminology, Vol. 13, No. 2, 155-176 (2009)
DOI: 10.1177/1362480609102877


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