Constitutional vulnerability: challenges for feminist monetary re-design in post-COVID-19 political economies

Abstract

Innovations in monetary design continue to develop alongside insights from heterodox schools of thought, notably ecological economics. Feminist approaches, however, have lacked some critical purchase on the issue, guided by a feminist economics tradition which reflects certain ideas about value from neoliberal economic orthodoxy – including on the neutrality of money. This article situates discussion of the principles of money in the context of COVID-19, interpreting a paradox of hope for monetary design as the need to close an ‘epistemological gap’ between money and either the value of speech or the materiality of bodies. Using a post-structural analysis of the governing tendencies of ‘fiat money’, the article demonstrates possibilities and risks for feminist interventions in monetary re-design. The conclusions offer a biopolitical interpretation of Christine Desan’s influential ‘constitutional approach’ to money as a form of vulnerability for citizens, and the need for feminist political economy to uphold a referential gap in money’s design, looking to innovations beyond the state.