Document Type
Honors Project
Abstract
This project examines how neoliberal economic policies and socialist signifiers have co-existed in Vietnam since the 1980s market reforms. Focusing on Vietnam’s national airline, Vietnam Airlines, I draw on the ideas of Michel Foucault to show how neoliberal governmentality subsumes socialism to shape better citizens, workers, consumers, and human capital. Through an autoethnographic thick description of a flight from Ho Chi Minh City to San Francisco, I capture neoliberal governmentality's intimate interactions with the subject. With Aihwa Ong's theory of “neoliberalism as exception” as a guide, I analyze how the selective deployment of socialist signifiers in the spaces, practices, and texts I encounter throughout this flight produces a distinctly neoliberal Vietnamese citizen-subject.
Recommended Citation
Nguyen, Huong, "Bác Hồ in the Business Lounge: The Curious Case of Vietnam's Neoliberal Socialists" (2024). Media and Cultural Studies Honors Projects. 15.
https://digitalcommons.macalester.edu/hmcs_honors/15
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