Researcher Theory / CLiC
01.01.08 – 31.12.09
My project aims to investigate the question of how the symbolic order that we call capitalism is supported by the desire economy of the participants and to query the role of money in the articulation of this desire. This question is an expansion of the problematic of my current research at the Jan van Eyck on the reading of capitalism, using a psychoanalytic framework of ideology critique. The new line of investigation moves away from the primarily structuralist reading of capitalism’s constitutive ideology (with money as the main vehicle of meaning and consistency) towards the analysis of the support of this ideology by the subject and her desire economy.
As long as the desire economy operates entirely in the (alienating) field of the signifier of the capitalist symbolic order, desire looks for its object in commodities, while enjoyment is regulated in their consumption. The ability and the freedom to enjoy as well as the prohibitions against enjoyment are perceived by the subject in economic or, more precisely, in monetary terms. These monetary constrains mask the fundamental inability of the capitalist symbolic order to provide for the enjoyment of the subject. When the subject fails to grasp, she resists the realisation of the very impossibility of full (?) enjoyment. She rather perceives this failure as her own inability to consume as much as she desires. The failure of consumption creates only the impulse for more consumption.
The perverse channelling of desire towards money is manifested in the constitution of subjectivity in capitalism. The tendency of individuals to think about their identity, their personal value and their social relations in terms of money is a symptom of this perversion. Georg Simmel, in his discussion on modernity and the contribution of money in its establishment, uses among his examples the figures of the Miser and the Spendthrift: two extreme types that are suggestive of the perverse relation to money. The study of the Miser and the Spendthrift, as well as of other typified subjectivities, like the Prostitute, the Poor and the Gambler, will be used in my analysis of the subject and its displaced desire in capitalism.
Athens, GR
PhD. Erasmus Institute of Philosophy and Economics, Erasmus Universiteit, Rotterdam, NL.
MPhil Economics and Philosophy. Erasmus Institute of Philosophy and Economics, Erasmus Universiteit, Rotterdam, NL.
MSc Philosophy of the Social Sciences. Department of Philosophy, Logic and Scientific Method, London School of Economics, London, GB.
BSc Economics. Department of International and European Economic Relations, Athens, University of Economics and Business, Athens, GR.
Assistant lecturer. Erasmus Institute of Philosophy and Economics, Erasmus Universiteit, Rotterdam, NL.
Independent financial consultant.
Military service. Trained as a tank commander and awarded the rank of sergeant.
Junior research assistant. Athens University of Economics and Business, Athens, GR.
Electronic money and the possibility of a cashless society. In: Social Sciences Research Network. Published on: http://papers.ssrn.com/sol3/papers.cfm?abstract_id=982781.
The evolution of the institution of money: The different trajectories and the role of technology. In: Proceedings of the EAEPE Annual conference 2006 (CD-ROM).
Trust in the monetary system. In: Proceedings of the EAEPE Annual conference 2005 (CD-ROM).
The triumph of religion. (19 – 20 September). Organised by Heyendaal Instituut; Jan van Eyck Academie & Radboud University. Nijmegen, NL: Radboud University.
Materialism today. (22 – 23 June). London, GB: The Birkbeck Institute for the Humanities.
Conceiling the designer: The illusion of the natural city in the 20th century. (1 – 2 June). Berlin, DE: Technische Universität Berlin.
DEAF07 symposium: Interact or die! (14 April). Rotterdam, NL.
Transmediale.07 conference: Unfinish! (31 January – 4 February). Berlin, DE.
University of Antwerp international conference: The locus of tragedy. (23 – 25 November). Antwerp, BE: Universiteit Antwerpen.
Post / Porn / Politics. (14 – 15 October). With Murat Aydemir, Bruce La Bruce, Katja Diefenbach, Stephan Geene, GirlsWhoLikePorno, Werner Hirsch, Bubu de la Madeleine, Namosh, Annie Sprinkle, Tim Stüttgen, Todd Verow & William Wheeler. Organised by Jan van Eyck Academie. Berlin, DE: Volksbühne.
The John Stuart Mill Bicentennial conference. (5 – 7 April). London, GB.
Transmediale.06 conference: Reality addicts. (2 – 5 February). Berlin, DE.
The historical roots of heterodox economics. STOREP European summer school. (12 – 21 September). Brixen, IT: Cusanus Akademie.
Transmediale.05 conference: Basics. (4 – 8 February). Berlin, DE.
DEAF04 symposium: Feelings are always local. (12 – 13 November). Rotterdam, NL: V2.
State of Emergency. Territorial identity in the post-political age. (23 September). Organised by Jan van Eyck Academie & Stedelijk Museum CS. Amsterdam, NL.
Present at destruction? US power and the multilateral global order. (12 – 13 March). London, GB: London School of Economics and Political Science.
The methodology of positive economics. Friedman’s essay at 50. (12 – 13 December). Rotterdam, NL: Erasmus Institute for Philosophy of Economics.
European Association for Evolutionary Political Economy (EAEPE) annual conference. The information society. Understanding its institutions interdisciplinary. (7 – 19 November). Maastricht, NL.
Economics for the future. (17 – 19 September). Cambridge, GB: Cambridge University.
Innovations inside and outside the firms. Erasmus Summer lectures. (22 – 28 June). Rotterdam, NL: Erasmus Institute of Management.
Psycho-analyzing money. Challenging the ideological foundations of contemporary culture. In: Opening week 2008. (7 – 11 January). Maastricht, NL: Jan van Eyck Academie.
Trajectories of money. In: European Association for Evolutionary Political Economy (EAEPE) annual conference: Developing economies. Multiple trajectories, multiple developments. (2 – 4 November). Istanbul, TR: Galatasaray University.
Trust in the monetary system. In: European Association for Evolutionary Political Economy (EAEPE) annual conference: A pluralistic forum. (10 – 12 November). Bremen, DE.
The omnipresence of money, the omnipresence of globalisation. In: Globalisation and representation. (12 – 13 March). Brighton, GB: University of Brighton.
Conceptualizing money: Its meaning, its institutional character and its place in a Walrasian equilibrium. In: European Association for Evolutionary Political Economy (EAEPE) annual conference: Economics, history and development. (28 – 31 October). Rethymnon, GR.
The element of choice in the construction of economic models, values and the ceteris paribus clause. In: International Network for Economic Method (INEM) annual conference. (19 – 21 August). Amsterdam, NL.
Commenting l’Argent/Marka. (28 June). With Emiliano Battista, Gal Kirn & Société Réaliste. Paris, FR: Le Plateau.
On economics and psychoanalysis. (4 October). With Katja Diefenbach, Antke Engel, Dominiek Hoens, Marc De Kesel, Yannis Stavrakakis, Panagiotis Tsakalogiannis & Gon Zifroni. Maastricht, NL: Jan van Eyck Academie.
9th International workshop on institutional economics: property, money and firms: The forgotten role of law and the state. (21 – 22 June). Hatfield, GB: University of Hertfordshire.
7th International workshop on institutional economics: Institutions and economic development. (22 – 24 June). Hatfield, GB: University of Hertfordshire.