THE ZOMBIE BANK AND THE MAGIC OF FINANCE

Taylor Nelms

Journal of Cultural Economy, 2012, vol. 5, issue 2, 231-246

Abstract: This paper takes the appearance of the figure of the ‘zombie bank’ during the recent financial crisis as a starting point to think about how to historicize crisis. A zombie bank is an undercapitalized financial institution that continues to operate due to the support extended to it by the government; it emerged in 2009 as a vivid representation of contemporary capitalism in crisis. By tracing the intertwined histories of zombies and representations of capitalism, I argue for the importance of historical persistence when considering anxieties about the ‘magic’ of finance provoked by the recent crisis. Fears of zombie banks, I suggest, recapitulate capitalism's whitewashed origins in credit and in the Caribbean. The crisis, therefore, represents an opportunity not only to reflect on current engagements with capitalism through an investigation of the figure of the zombie bank, but also to interrogate our models of historical continuity.

Date: 2012
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DOI: 10.1080/17530350.2012.660793

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