In search of a post-socialist mode of governmentality: The double movement of accommodating and resisting neo-liberalism in Vietnam

Abstract

This paper examines the mode of governmentality applicable as an analytical framework in socialist states committed to market socialism. The successes of socialist states like China and Vietnam over the past few decades since their market-based reforms are attributable to this diversifying mode of governmentality and have challenged the binary dichotomy between socialism and neoliberalism. The party-states in China and Vietnam have begun to search for a post-socialist mode of governmentality, which resonates with the departure from neoliberalism towards post-neoliberalism in various capitalist countries. In Vietnam, there are signs of reconfiguration and restructuring of the party-states in such a highly complicated and fluid context to adapt themselves to a more sustainable governmentality. This results in the amorphous and ambivalent situation of a double movement of accommodating and resisting neoliberalism. That, in turn, reveals significant implications for a transformative potential for political change.