In "The Well-Tempered Self", Miller contends that the modern capitalist state musters a variety of mixed messages about the nature of citizenship and the self. Miller argues that capitalism's democratic politics requires selfless, community-minded citizens, while its economics depends on selfish, utilitarian consumers. To fulfil these conflicting needs for political order and economic prosperity, powerful cultural forces are employed to instill a sense of "ethical incompleteness". Citizens are then offered political, cultural and economic opportunities to become better, happier and more fulfilled - opportunities that, in turn, encourage loyalty to both the political and economic systems. In a series of case studies that demonstrate this process, Miller examines mass entertainment, political discourse, and methods of resistance to these powerful cultural forces.

Miller's work is extremely engaging, original, and successful in producing a set of innovative analyses of the formation of cultural subjects. -- Douglas Kellner, University of Texas, Austin This is a major work on the connection of theoretical to political practice under postmodernity. At once rigorous and readable, its academic concerns will be both accessible and useful to readers asking-as contemporary readers indomitably do-what these debates in cultural theory have to do with the conduct of theirsocial lives. -- Meaghan Morris, author of The Pirate's Fiancee: Feminism, Reading, Postmodernism

About the Author

Toby Miller is assistant professor in the Department of Cinema Studies at New York University. He has taught at Murdoch and Griffith universities in Australia and has worked as a research officer with the Australian Senate and as an announcer and cultural commentator for the Australian Broadcasting Corporation.

Reviews
This Fouauldian analysis of political identity- formation, social ethics, and cultural policy in advanced capitalist societies is a timely addition to democratic theory. Miller contrasts the ethic of 'incompleteness' which produces an accelerated and self-policing citizens to the 'autoinvention' exemplified by (some) new social movements and hinted at Foucault's later works. The middle, substantive chapters are the strongest; Miller marshalls a wealth of original data on the deep schism between selfless citizen and self-serving customer underlying much Australian and Brittish Public Policy; the politics of incivility (again, in Australia); and the issue of 'cultural imperialism' under the General Agreement on Tarriffs and Trade. These imaginative discussion denaturalize such classic concepts as national identity, state sovreignty, individual autonomy, self-discovery, and civic virtue. Choice



Book Information
ISBN 9780801846045
Author Toby Miller
Format Paperback
Page Count 320
Imprint Johns Hopkins University Press
Publisher Johns Hopkins University Press
Weight(grams) 425g