Discussion: Wendy Brown and Jill Magid

For a series of public programs connected to her Renaissance Society solo exhibition Tender: Balance, artist Jill Magid invited scholars from three different fields — anthropology, political theory, and art history—to share their perspective on the show and join her in conversation about her work and theirs.

On May 12th, Magid talked with renowned political theorist Wendy Brown, who teaches at the University of California, Berkeley, where she is Class of 1936 First Chair in Political Science. Brown’s recent books, including In the Ruins of Neoliberalism: The Rise of Antidemocratic Politics in the West (Columbia, 2019) and Undoing the Demos: Neoliberalism’s Stealth Revolution (Zone 2014), describe how neoliberal rationality infuses every aspect of our lives, reorganizing society around markets and traditional morality, with unforeseen consequences for the health of democracy.