The presentation examines some critiques of the financial market as a risk allocation system.
The (post-)Keynesians criticise the very idea of risk as a (negative) commodity. According to this school of thought, the mathematical calculation of future uncertainty is an impossibility, as the economy is characterised by radical uncertainty. Thus the narrative of risk calculation itself can be seen as a form a power, as often noted in genealogies of finance: who is in a position to claim "objectivity" in risk assessments, and who can claim to operate in a transparent risk market (when there strictly is no such thing)?
However, the financial markets can also be criticised as unjust risk allocation systems. Risks are distributed with important social consequences, as has often been noted during financial crises. Risk allocation determines whose interests and claims are prioritized in a time of crisis - even though the very underlying notion of risk might rest on a false claim to scientific objectivity. Further, financial markets are not contained, but “spill over” to other spheres of social life, so that any risk allocation is a considerably wider matter of justice than what the idea of the financial market as a trading venue would suggest.
The presentation analyses the contradictions and overlap between these two different critiques: finance as cultural power to claim objectivity in assessment of future uncertainties, and finance as political power to arrange social priority orders. In conclusion, I will discuss their compatibility as a single critique of finance as power.
