The Gender Politics of Financial Influencers

This article examines the politics of financial influencers, so called ‘finfluencers’. It draws on feminist political economy to interrogate how financial influencers perpetuate gendered stereotypes in different ways – from the toxic right-wing masculinity of alpha-man finfluencers to the white middle-class femininity of girlboss finfluencers. It argues that gendered knowledge of (financial) influencers is crucial in accounting for the structural inequalities that underpin digital communication, online media consumption and online engagement, while the absence of gendered analysis further sediments the patterns of gendered privilege and exclusion that threaten (digital) public discourse and democracy.