The Uncertain Subjects of Everyday Borrowing

This chapter focuses on the embodiment of the borrowing boom, and the re-making of mortgagors and credit card borrowers in particular. The first part of the chapter concentrates on the responsible borrowers of contemporary credit card networks, a subject position referred to as the ‘revolver’. Revolvers not only regularly make use of the revolving credit facilities, but also manipulate their outstanding balances in order to further their consumptive freedom and security into the future. The second part of the chapter concentrates on the responsible and entrepreneurial borrower of contemporary Anglo-American mortgage networks. It suggests that mortgagors are no longer ‘suburban subjects’, that is, owner-occupiers who view their home as essential in meeting their aspirations. Rather, the borrowing boom in mortgage networks rests on the assembly of mortgagors as ‘leveraged investors’. Leveraged investors are owner-occupiers who view residential property as an asset that will grow to realize returns. The third and final part of the chapter considers the tensions and contradictions present in the assembly of responsible and entrepreneurial borrowers, and thereby reveal the incomplete and precarious performance of these subjectivities.