Emprendeudores fracasados: Individualización neoliberal en los discursos sobre el desempleo

Abstract

This article argues that the entrepreneurship discourse operates as an individualization apparatus of the wage relation which hides the strong contrast between the ideal level-autonomy, subjective independence, success- and the real material obstacles-deepening of debt, high failure rate, precarization-. Two cases are empirically analyzed: 1) The Activation for Employment Forum organized by Madrid regional government, which promotes what we call competitive neoliberal narcissism; and 2) the contrasts between the ideal level and the material level in the discourses of unemployed people who were interviewed in 2012 and 2013. It is concluded that employment policies that promote entrepreneurship do not solve the problem of unemployment but mainly serve to govern politically the massive precariousness. It is proposed to use the categories of emprendeudores and emprendeudamiento [entrepreneurs + debt category] for a better sociological understanding of the entrepreneurship discourse.