“Neo-Liberalism as a Creative Destruction” by Harvey Research Paper

Introduction

An article Neo-liberalism as a Creative Destruction, written by American political scientist David Harvey attempts to expose a hidden destructive side of the neo-liberal paradigm, dominant in the modern world. Starting from the explanation of neo-liberalism, Harvey draws the reader’s attention to the “naturalization” of the neo-liberal approach and the reasons behind the global neo-liberal turn. In his interpretation, a neo-liberal promise of justice and freedom led to the disguised restoration of class power and creative destruction of lower classes. Regardless of whether Harvey’s arguments in favor of hypocrisy and harmful effects of neo-liberalism are true, the linguistic interest of his work lies in the grammatical techniques he used for stating his point. Overall, Harvey’s work allows us to understand how a skillful usage of language can give weight to non-mainstream ideas and why modern English teaching should emphasize specific aspects of grammar.

Grammar Analysis of Published Paper

Throughout the paper, David Harvey utilized several grammar features of academic written English. More specifically, Harvey widely used the following elements of English grammar: relative clauses, conjunctive adverbs, and attributive adjectives to stress his concerns about neo-liberalism and break its disguise. This section contains examples of how the author skillfully utilized grammar to create a disturbing picture of the neo-liberal world, which promotes class segregation and inequality under the flag of freedom and justice.

Examples of Relative Clauses

Relative clauses play an important role in the creation of an atmosphere of inevitability with which neo-liberalism claimed dominance in the world. As Harvey argues, ‘state after state from the new states that emerged from the collapse of the Soviet Union to old-style social democracies… have embraced… some version of neoliberal theory” (Harvey 145). The neo-liberal domination is evident since “advocates for the neoliberal way now occupy positions of considerable influence in… international institutions such as the IMF and the WTO that regulate global finance and trade” (Harvey 145). Moreover, the neo-liberals managed to use the lucrative values of personal freedom and justice to construct “a conceptual apparatus, that appeals almost ‘naturally’ to our intuitions and instincts” (Harvey 146). These examples are taken from the very first pages of the paper; hence the reader can imagine the spread of relative clauses in the whole work.

Such a copious usage of relative clauses serves to portray neo-liberalism as a relentless spider that caught the whole world in its web. Harvey goes even further and finds similarities between the rise of the Pinochet regime in Chile and American intervention in Iraq, which resulted in neo-liberal economic transformations. He sees both cases as a manifestation of the coercive influence, a fact “that the grim reach of US imperial power might lie behind the rapid proliferation of neoliberal state forms” (Harvey 147).

Later on, Harvey exposes an elitist nature of free-market neo-liberalism, which helped the business and political elite to oppress the people, and uses a relative clause to state his main point. “It is the profoundly anti-democratic nature of neo-liberalism that should be the main focus of political struggle” (Harvey 157). Overall, David Harvey successfully utilized relative clauses to point at specific features of neo-liberalism and attack its disguise in his understanding.

Examples of Conjunctive Adverbs

Conjunctive adverbs are crucial for academic writing since they facilitate a logical, smooth flow of the narrative and lead the reader to the author’s key points. Harvey used a significant amount of conjunctive adverbs to provide a better transition between the paper’s parts or enhance the quality of explanation. For instance, after claiming the importance of a free-market economy in the neo-liberal paradigm, Harvey adds: “Furthermore, if markets do not exist…they must be created, by state action if necessary” (Harvey 145).

By adding a conjunctive adverb, Harvey underlined that neo-liberalism is not against direct state intervention if it suits its interests. In his description of forceful neo-liberalization after the Iraqi war, Harvey also uses a conjunctive adverb — “However, the interim Iraqi government…could only confirm the decrees already promulgated (Harvey 147). In this case, the conjunctive adverb stressed the non-democratic nature of neo-liberal reforms “suggested” by the U.S. advisors.

Another usage of conjunctive adverbs in academic writing lies in the formulation of conclusions. After arguing that the ideals of freedom and individual choice have proven to be a powerful historical factor, Harvey states: “therefore, appeals to freedom and liberty surround us rhetorically at every turn” (Harvey 146). After that, he provides examples of appeals to freedom from President Bush’s speeches before the Iraqi war and proceeds to expose the non-negotiable neo-liberalization imposed on Iraq.

Therefore, Harvey achieved two goals with one conjunctive adverb — he logically presented his conclusion and prepared a transition to the next part of his case against neo-liberalism. In the end, Harvey maintained the coherence of his work and used the prepared ground to point at the hypocrisy of the neo-liberal approach, which pretended to be pro-democratic while denying Iraq an actual choice.

Examples of Attributive Adjectives

Academic writing should not necessarily be dry or dull; sometimes, expressive adjectives can reinforce the author’s point and improve an overall impression from the paper. Harvey has utilized attributive adjectives that stand in front of the noun to strengthen his work’s points further. For example, he called neo-liberalization a “vast tidal wave of institutional reform”, pointing at its unstoppable, even destructive force (Harvey 145). The “grim reach” of the American power was seen as the main driving force of neo-liberalization, which further adds to the negative image of the neo-liberal reforms force (Harvey 147).

In addition, Harvey described neo-liberalism as a “huge success from the standpoint of the upper classes” (Harvey 152). Therefore, the smart use of attributive adjectives allowed to present neo-liberalism as an anti-democratic paradigm, which serves only the elite’s good.

Finally, Harvey utilized an attributive adjective to deliver a decisive blow against the neo-liberal paradigm. He claimed that “exposing its seductive rhetoric used so effectively to justify and legitimate the restoration of (class) power, has a significant role to play in (political) struggle” (Harvey 157). Essentially, Harvey portrayed neo-liberalism as a devious way of controlling the people and redistributing their wealth in favor of elites.

One might argue that the use of such grammar tools cannot be considered academic. However, Harvey based his research on the empiric results of neo-liberal transformations worldwide, and grammar only strengthened his point. In the end, one should remember that a poor presentation of results might undermine the most brilliant thought put into the work. Therefore, learning the necessary grammar skills and putting them to practical use might appear to be a threshold between success and failure.

Common Grammar Issues in Modern English

Over the last few decades, English has become a language of international communication, used by billions in written and spoken communication. Therefore, English is learned by many non-native speakers as a secondary language, which creates certain difficulties in understanding certain grammatical concepts. Since grammar has proved to be one of the more challenging aspects for English learners, the researchers put effort into revealing the scope of grammar-related issues (Widianingsih and Gulö 141). This section explores the most frequent areas of grammatical errors in modern English.

Subject-Verb Agreement

Errors in subject-verb agreement appeared to be one of the most common obstacles to constructing grammatically correct sentences. For instance, research conducted at the English Department of Jubail University College in Saudi Arabia showed that 14% of students in the test group committed subject-verb agreement errors (Rana et al. 29). The students faced problems in agreement, which caused the building of the following sentences (Rana et al. 29):

• Obesity leads to an unhealthy life (instead of “Obesity leads to an unhealthy life);
• Studying in a group develop the communication skills of students (the correct variant is “Studying in a group develops the communication skills of students)

A significant portion of subject-verb agreement mistakes comes from the first language (L1) influence. An analysis at the Saudi King Khalid University revealed that 55 out of 590, or 9,32% of total errors listed, were committed in subject-verb agreement (Nuruzzaman et al. 36). A specific example of such error: “People in our city are very kind”, instead of “are very kind” (Nuruzzaman et al. 36).

However, the issue with a subject-verb agreement is not exclusive to people whose first language is Arabic. According to the research conducted at Stamford University Bangladesh, out of 2122 mistakes in English writing, 305, or 14,37%, were committed in subject-verb agreement (Afrin 108). An example of a typical error in agreement: “In Pohela Boishakh females wears sari and males wears pajama and Panjabi” (Afrin 109). Therefore, an explanation of subject-verb agreement rules should become one of the priorities for the English language teacher since many learners have different agreement rules in their first language. Otherwise, the subject-verb agreement would remain a prevalent grammatical issue in modern written and spoken English.

Verb Tenses

The English language has a complicated system of tenses and verb forms, which could be challenging to grasp, especially for non-native speakers. According to Afrin, that feature of English makes students confused, as they do not understand which tense is required to express the meaning they wish to convey (109). Moreover, unlike the problem with subject-verb agreement, which comes from L1 interference, incorrect usage of tenses stems from inadequate understanding of grammatical rules (Rana et al. 30). As a result, grammatical issues related to verb tenses and their wrong usage appear quite prevalent in modern English.

Quantitative data proves the difficulty of English verb tenses, as they caused a significant number of errors among the test group members in various studies. Afrin reported 396 verb tenses-related errors or 18,66% of the total number of errors committed by the students of the sample group (108). For example, one of the students wanted to use present tense, but instead of saying, “I want to say that I like Pohela Boishakh very much,” they said, “I told that I like Pohela Boishakh very much” (Afrin 109). This sentence clearly shows confusion created by the lack of verb tenses understanding.

Other works on grammatical errors prove the prevalence of issues with verb tenses among modern English learners. In research by Nuruzzaman et al., verb tenses contributed to 61 errors of 590, or 10,33% (36). A specific example of wrong tense usage from the research: “Last week, I visit Riyadh”, instead of correct “Last week, I visited Riyadh” (Nuruzzaman et al. 36). Widianingsih and Gulö found that students predominantly used the present tense to express distinctions of time (144). As a result, the students formed incorrect grammatical constructions such as “When I am a child” and “After I learn to read” (Widianingsih and Gulö 144). Finally, Rana et al. discovered that 11% of all errors committed by the students were related to verb tenses, which is second only to the subject-verb agreement among the grammatical errors (29). Overall, the lack of knowledge and confidence about verb tenses makes them a common grammar issue in today’s English.

Punctuation, Fragments, and Run-on Sentences

The English learners can sometimes overlook punctuation; however, such neglect could lead to more obvious errors — fragmented and run-on sentences. According to Afrin, a wish to write complex sentences without proper knowledge of punctuation caused 218 (10,27% of the total number) punctuation mistakes, and 131 (6,17%) mistakes with fragments (109). Rana et al. provided several examples of errors committed due to the inadequate knowledge of punctuation (31):

• “Students don’t have time to finish their homework they plagiarize” instead of “Students don’t have time to finish their homework, so they plagiarize”. An absence of a comma leads to the improper connection of two independent clauses and disrupts the logical connection;
• “Online education is cheaper people can upload their courses online”. A lack of comma creates ambiguity that hinders understanding. On the contrary, a variant “online education is cheaper, and people can upload their courses online significantly improves the logical flow of the sentence.

Overall, grammatical errors related to punctuation are quite common among modern English learners. Moreover, these errors tend to result in significant and easily noticeable mistakes in the structure of written sentences. Therefore, English learners should understand the importance of correct punctuation if they wish to properly connect several independent clauses in a single sentence. Otherwise, the result might be opposite to the initial design, as incorrect punctuation can turn what was intended to be an impressive verbal construction into a comical mess.

Conclusion

Grammar can be a double-edged sword for spoken and written English. This notion is especially true for writing since possible errors are vivid and can hardly be justified by the lack of time. At the same time, skillful grammar usage can improve the overall impression from the speech or written piece and even strengthen the author’s point. For example, David Harvey utilized relative clauses, conjunctive adverbs, and attributive adjectives to make his criticism of neo-liberalism sharper and closer to the reader.

However, modern English learners are facing multiple problems in regard to English grammar. Among the most prevalent issues revealed in this research paper are grammatical errors induced by subject-verb agreement, verb tenses, punctuation, and run-on sentences. Both English language teachers and students should be mindful of these common issues, especially when they are caused by interference of the native (L1) language. In the end, one should obtain an understanding of the basic grammar concepts before trying to utilize grammar as a tool of expression. Failing to do that would only lower the quality of spoken or written English.

Works Cited

Afrin, Shagia. “Writing Problems of Non-English Major Undergraduate Students in Bangladesh: An Observation.” Open Journal of Social Sciences, vol. 4, no. 3, 2016, pp. 104–115.

Harvey, David. “Neo‐Liberalism as Creative Destruction.” Geografiska Annaler: Series B, Human Geography, vol. 88, no. 2, 2006, pp. 145–158.

Nuruzzaman, Mohammed, et al. “An Analysis of Errors Committed by Saudi Non-English Major Students in the English Paragraph Writing: A Study of Comparisons.” Advances in Language and Literary Studies, vol. 9, no.1, 2018, pp. 31–39.

Rana, Seemeen, et al. “Grammatical Errors in English Writing Made by Senior Students of English Department at Jubail University College: Problem Analysis, Reasons and Solutions.” International Journal of Arts and Commerce, vol. 8, no. 5, 2019, pp. 23–34.

Widianingsih, Ni Ketut Ayu, and Ingatan Gulö. “Grammatical Difficulties Encountered by Second Language Learners of English.” Proceedings of ISELT FBS Universitas Negeri Padang, vol. 4, no. 2, 2016, pp. 141–144.