The Spirit of Financial Capitalism - A critical discourse analysis of stock magazine articles

Abstract

Finance has achieved an ever-greater meaning in contemporary society since a chain of deregulations. One practice that in particular has amassed importance as a means of capital accumulation is stock trading. This paper addresses and examines the discursive practice surrounding the financial practice of stock-trading from the perspective of Fairclough’s (2013) Critical Discourse Analysis and Boltanski and Chiapello (1999) concept of the spirit of capitalism. In particular I address the discourses, genres and styles identified in articles from Swedish civil society organization The Stock Savers’ stock magazine The Stock Saver and how the content of the articles are coherent with the notion of stimulation, security and fairness of a spirit of capitalism. The articles selected for analysis comprise various genres related to social action: guide, political opinion, narrative/personal story among others. In terms of style, the financial subject is primarily someone who embraces nuances of risk. Moreover, they are callous and rational in their financial practice but also passionate and with desire to win. The genre and style are figures in representations within discourses of neoliberalism, financialization, accountability, moral, community, psychology, history, organization and leisure, which in this study have been interpreted as being related to the three dimensions of a spirit of capitalism. Concludingly, it is suggested that the analysis also reveals how the discursive practice of the stock magazine The Stock Saver is an example of how finance as a social structure is reproduced.