Bodies as Productive Machines

Introduction

The Neoliberal framework may view human bodies as machines whose sole purpose is production for the economy. Bodies must be healthy to work and be productive, therefore, health care in neoliberal systems may function not for keeping the population healthy but to keep people’s bodily machines in working order. Furthermore, Women's bodies in this system are mores counted on for unpaid labour in the global system and even their bodies may be seen as a tool to literally reproduce the workforce.

Neoliberalism

Neoliberalism may be seen both as a form of government and “a defining political movement today” (Bockman, 2013, p.14). The underlying theory of neoliberalism is that governments are unable to create economic growth or supply social welfare, instead, when the government intervenes, governments hinder the success of these systems. Instead, private companies, private individuals, and most importantly, unhindered markets are best able to generate economic growth and social welfare” (Bockman, 2013, p.14). Neoliberal systems have even overtaken globalisation as the dominant reason for modern economic restructuring. Under this framework national economies are subjected to the influence of global institutions and multinational corporations such as the IMF and the World Bank (Larner, 2003, p. 509).

Neoliberal Health Care Systems

Health care in the Global South is comparatively poor to the Global North, however, countries which benefit the most from neoliberalism are the ones that have better healthcare systems (Sosnaud & Beckfield, 2017). This phenomenon seems contradictory because neoliberal frameworks do not value public spending on healthcare. It may be seen, however, that the neoliberal framework values healthy bodies that are able to produce a work output. Therefore, neoliberal nations funnel money into public health care, not for the sake of keeping its citizens healthy but for the sake of keeping workers economically productive for the wealth and power of the state. In this way neoliberal institutions frame human beings as machines that must be used for production. Healthcare helps maintain the force of machines so more capital gain may be seized.
In this way we may see that biopolitics and neoliberalism are closely linked (Hull, 2013).

Women's Health

The neoliberal health system also exists to keep women’s bodies producing. Women are responsible for a vast amount of unpaid labour that substantially supports neoliberal economies, therefore, these systems have much at stake in moralizing women’s health and stigmatizing unproductive women. In addition, women are under vast pressure to assume cosmetic coverups of their cancer (Waples, 2014). Therefore, when women's bodies are no longer productive, they are pressured to increase their spending as consumers.

Breast Cancer

Breast cancer is a moralized illness which highlights issues of women’s unpaid labour. Women facing breast cancer are imbued with an intersectional identity both as a woman and as a disabled person. Even though breast cancer is an illness, the stigmatization of women with breast cancer makes it function as a disability. In this way, these two identities interact to place intense societal pressures upon women. Breast cancer may be seen as a highly moralized illness. Women are expected to maintain a positive outlook through their ordeal with cancer and are shamed for acknowledging the disabilities that come along with breast cancer. This moralization occurs because keeping women healthy is of the utmost importance to the neoliberal system. Women may be seen as the most important force holding a neoliberal economy together. This is because of reproductive labour.

Breast Cancer as Consumerism

Furthermore, disease, especially breast cancer may also aid in upholding the neoliberal consumer economic system. Jain asserts that breast cancer may be the "perfect capitalist disease" (2007, p. 507) because by the time the disease is detected, usually that person's productive years are over.

Reproductive Work

Women are depended upon to literally reproduce children to reproduce the workforce. Whereas, reproductive labour is the unpaid labour performed in the home which includes housework and emotional work such are care of others. It may be recognized as an important foundation of inequality between sexes. (Scott, 2014) The neoliberal economy exploits women for their unpaid labour which establishes a concealed subsidy to the economy. In addition, women reproduce the workforce both through biological reproduction and education. Women often take on roles as caretakers for children, hence, in addition to reproducing the future workforce, women have the responsibility to teach children basic life skills to prepare them to become productive workers one day. Women are under immense amounts of pressure to put massive amounts of effort into raising their children. This can be called intensive mothering which is “the notion that good mothers should invest vast amounts of time, money, energy, and emotional labor in mothering” (Elliott, Powell, & Brenton, 2015, p. 351).
In this way, women's unpaid domestic labour in the home is a driving force behind the neoliberal economy and people’s health interests, especially women's, are protected in strong neoliberal systems not because their health is of value but their healthy body which can produce labour is what is being protected for the good of the neoliberal economic system.

References

Bockman, J. (2013). neoliberalism. Contexts, 12(3), 14-15. doi:10.1177/1536504213499873

Elliott, S., Powell, R., & Brenton, J. (2015). Being a good mom: Low-income, black single mothers negotiate intensive mothering. Journal of Family Issues, 36(3), 351-370. doi:10.1177/0192513X13490279

Hull, G. (2013). Biopolitics is not (primarily) about life: On biopolitics, neoliberalism, and families. The Journal of Speculative Philosophy, 27(3), 322-335. doi:10.5325/jspecphil.27.3.0322

Jain, S. L. (2007). Cancer butch. Cultural Anthropology, 22(4), 501-538. doi:10.1525/can.2007.22.4.501

Larner, W. (2003). neoliberalism? Environment and Planning D: Society and Space, 21(5), 509-512. doi:10.1068/d2105ed

(2014). reproductive labour. In Scott, J.(Ed.), A Dictionary of Sociology. : Oxford University Press. Retrieved 2 Nov. 2017, from http://www.oxfordreference.com.ezproxy.library.ubc.ca/view/10.1093/acref/9780199683581.001.0001/acref-9780199683581-e-1936.

Sosnaud, B., & Beckfield, J. (2017). Trading equality for health? evaluating the trade-off and institutional hypotheses on health inequalities in the global south. Journal of Health and Social Behavior, 58(3), 340-356. doi:10.1177/0022146517721950

Waples, E. (2014). Emplotted bodies: Breast cancer, feminism, and the future. Tulsa Studies in Women's Literature, 33(1), 47-70.