The “Triumph of Imbecile Institutions Over Life”: Death Cults as an Enabling Myth of Late Neoliberalism

This article links late Neoliberal Financialized Capitalism (NFC) with biopolitics, identity crises, and emerging death cults. It is argued that late NFC entails spreading violence in state and society, increasing premature and violent deaths in growing subcultures. Individualistic ideologies—which lower social strata now embrace as enabling myths—suggest renewed celebration of struggle for survival and death cults. From an institutionalist perspective, the regressive institutional change increases the predominance of ceremonial values and habits, which indicates a “triumph of imbecile institutions over life and culture” (Veblen, Thorstein B., The Instinct of Workmanship). Contemporary death cults convert violent dying into a consumable merchandise and a form of entertainment. We illustrate the normalization of violent death in the popular youth culture of Mexico’s drug trafficking industry. Its musical genre, known as corridos sanguinarios, songs of blood, is analyzed. Our results show manifold ambivalences of contemporary death cults between social compliance and revolt, which may deepen our understanding of the socioeconomic, institutional, and political future under late NFC.