Fiscal extraction by sovereignty: Calculative bordering and differential entanglement in the Eurozone crisis
Journal
Anthropological Theory
ISSN
2330-4847
2330-4847
Type
journal article
Date Issued
2024
Author(s)
Abstract
The article analyzes struggles about distributive justice in Austria, one of the wealthiest countries globally, and proposes a reinforced focus on how metaphors of redistribution and reciprocity create fiscal imaginaries. It analyzes how politicians, lobbyists, and activists strategically mobilize these metaphors in corporate and wealth taxation debates. Campaigns against wealth taxation portray wealth taxation as negative reciprocity and a threat to an imagined middle class. Those arguing in favor of them create images of unjustly appropriated value that needs to be redistributed. The article analyzes those shifts between notions of redistribution and reciprocity and the fiscal imaginaries created through these debates. Notably, the article argues for the necessity to embed discursive analysis within an understanding of contemporary capitalisms. It contrasts the fiscal imaginaries with challenges of fiscal relations, most importantly the distributed character of capital accumulation and the dilemma of the tax state, as governments orchestrate accumulation to capture parts of its value generated via taxation.
Volume
24
Number
3
Start page
311
End page
324
Pages
13
Subject(s)