Lobbying, litigating and fundraising replaced mass mobilization and public dissent as primary modes of activism for equality, even as the operative definition of ‘equality’ narrowed dramatically enough in some liberal reformist circles, to make peace with neoliberalism. And during that same decade, the liberal reform branches of the US-based social movements of the 1960s and 1970s crept ever rightward, increasingly abandoning the broad social cultural economic and politic critiques and transformative visions that once fed them. After a brilliant historical examination of how racial and gender inequities were woven into the very theoretical underpinnings of the neoliberal model of the state, Duggan shows. How much of the left has been co-opted by neoliberalism and shifted rightward: “During the 1990s, neoliberal politics and policies enjoyed years of breathtaking global dominance, seeming invincibility and stunning success in redistributing the world’s resources ever upward. The Twilight of Equalitysearches out these links through an analysis of the politics of the 1990s, the decade when neoliberalism-free market economics-became gospel.

On the other side is a newly emergent ‘equality’ politics that supports ‘diversity’ and ‘tolerance’ but defines these in the narrowest terms, and entirely within the framework of globalist neoliberalism.” She is the author of many works, including The Twilight of Equality: Neoliberalism, Cultural Politics, and the Attack on Democracy, and Sapphic Slashers. Adapted from Lisa Duggan, The Twilight of Equality: Neoliberalism, Cultural Politics and the Attack on Democracy (Boston: Beacon Press, 2003). The Twilight of Equality: Neoliberalism, Cultural Politics and the Attack on Democracy (Beacon Press, 2003) Buy on Amazon.

Lisa Duggan locates in this sensationalized event the emergence of the lesbian in U.S. On one side is the residual strategy of cultural traditionalism deployed during the late 20th century ‘culture wars’ - energetic attacks against “multiculturalism” and “permissiveness” intended to shrink the funding bases as well as popular support for sites of non market politics-the arts, education and social services. THE TWILIGHT OF EQUALITY - NEOLIBERALISM, CULTURAL POLITICS. Duggan’s characterization of the limits of American political discourse today: “The newly more visible conflicts among elites is accompanied by an overlapping conflict over cultural politics.

Lisa duggan the twilight of equality