Constructing ‘progressive neoliberal’ citizens

From frequent television advertisements to posters in jet bridges all over the globe, the public is continuously subjected to messages affirming the inception of a flat, borderless world. While these discourses suggest globalization is bringing humanity together into a globally connected, cosmopolitan world order based on a shared, global citizenship, such corporate advertisements also seek to convey the desirability and inevitability of a borderless economy in which they may roam unfettered. To illustrate how these ideas are communicated, I investigate three emblematic cases: Emirates Airlines, HSBC, and Itau. By interrogating their public discourses, this chapter elucidates how powerful actors seek to construct global (or regional–global) imaginaries for consumers by deploying aesthetically pleasing (and, at times, seemingly ‘subversive’) advertisements. Their ultimate effect is to demonstrate the would-be futility of attempts to regulate the spread of global capitalism or their own profit-seeking behavior. Through showing how pop-culture artifacts invoke a ‘progressive neoliberal’ logic to attempt to ‘sell’ teleological global capitalism and a spirit of global citizenship to audiences, this chapter thus highlights the role of cultural production in constructing the ideological hegemony of corporate globalization. To conclude, I briefly explore how this analysis relates to important political debates concerning agency in globalization, the feasibility of state regulation of global capitalism, and the construction of alternative global imaginaries/orders.