Against an Architecture of Neoliberal Technocracy: Lessons from (the Dissolution of) the Architecture of the Welfare State in Britain (NYP)

As another history of the present, Against an Architecture of Neoliberal Technocracy: Lessons from (the Dissolution of) the Architecture of the Welfare State in Britain problematises the contemporary disappearance of the architectures of social welfare. It addresses the dismantling of the welfare state in Britain and the transition to a state of neoliberal technocracy. The book argues that it was through the proliferation of specific technocratic operations in the production of the built environment that these changes became possible and the deployment of neoliberal forms of governance were facilitated as actions at a distance that direct our behaviours. It aims to be a critique, and a call, to re-define the role of architecture as a mechanism of social governance where the use value of architecture is prioritised against its subjective exchange value. Eleni Axioti is Lecturer and Co-ordinator in History and Theory Studies at the Architectural Association School of Architecture and Lecturer at University of the Arts London.