Post-Neoliberal Professionalism of the Neoliberal State: Reconfigurations and Effects of Political Change

This research studies the political roles that professional work assumes within the crisis of the neoliberal state in Chile. Thus, by studying a decade of professional reconfigurations of public administration and the initiatives that professionals autonomously undertake to influence the direction of state policy (state power), we can observe the contradictions and transformations of the neoliberal state from within. Our focus lies on the emergence and reproduction of post-neoliberal orientations of professional work, capable of mobilising specialised knowledge and produce meaning linked to the social struggles from the state. In this way, post-neoliberal professionalism and technocracies are different from the neoliberal technocracies defined by their capacity to reproduce links between markets and state policy. In turn, regarding the effects of such post-neoliberal professionalism, it implies to look at the level administrative innovations, as it has potential strategic relevance to explain the capacity to undertake policy changes by means of professional work linked to social demands. The empirical research uses a mixed methodology combining the statistical study of the professional reconfigurations of the public administration with changes of government – as a proxy of the political affinities between professions and universities with specific roles in the state – with qualitative material from interviews with professional state workers from different rank. To illustrate the hypothesis of post-neoliberal professionalism, we look at the cases of the ministries of Gender Equality and Education during the current centre-left-wing government of President Gabriel Boric, in order to characterise the reproduction and effects of the professional ideologies that lead the policy agendas in gender and education, the way they connect with social movements and demands, and their capacities to confront and transform the neoliberal framework of the state from within.