Masculinity, Labour and Neoliberalism: Reviewing the Field

This introductory chapter reviews the field of the critical study of men and masculinities as it relates to working-class men. The latter have been among the losers of neoliberal capitalism, as new insecurities in the labour markets of countries across the industrialized world have undermined their material position. In addition, they are undermined symbolically by media and policy discourses positioning them as backward and incapable of the forms of ‘work on the self’ required by neoliberal governmentality. In this introduction we explore work that has moved beyond discourses that either posit a ‘masculinity crisis’ or pathologize working-class men, and instead we look at the active ways men have dealt with forms of economic and symbolic marginalization and the barriers they have faced.