Re-phasing Neoliberalism: New Labour and Britain's Crisis of Street Homelessness

Abstract

In this paper we continue the task of fleshing out understandings of “actually existing neoliberalism”. More specifically, drawing on the work of Tom Ling, we suggest that Peck and Tickell's recent distinction between periods of roll-back/roll-out neoliberalisation can usefully be supplemented by the identification of a second, more powerful moment of roll-out neoliberalism—described by Ling in terms of the shift from a system of governance to one of “governmentality”. Illustrating our argument with an analysis of changing central government responses to a crisis of street homelessness in 1990s Britain, however, we draw attention to the uneven and often contrary effects of recent government policy in this field. The paper therefore concludes with a warning of the need to temper a reading of the juggernaut of roll-out neoliberalism with an awareness of the incomplete and plain “messy” character of actually existing neoliberalisation.