Infrastructuralism: An Introduction

Our introduction argues the importance of infrastructure—both the concept and the thing it denotes—to twenty-first-century critical and literary theory. Infrastructures are big, expensive technological undertakings that trouble the distinction between private and public ownership because they both draw on and contribute to the public good in ways that go beyond the limits of purely private enterprise. Examples include a CEO’s attempt to commodify water and a South African grassroots organization’s unconditional demand for government provision of basic services like water and electricity. The final section offers synopses of each of the essays in the volume.