ABSTRACT
One of Slavoj Zizek's most significant theoretical contributions is lus activation of Lacan's teachings on drive. Zizek explores drive throughout his work, using drive to rethink subjectivity, ideology, and ontology. This chapter explores the way Zizek's activation of the concept configures drive as a category for political economy. It uses drive to analyze the extreme capitalism of neoliberalism, highlighting derivatives as the commodity form of drive, and highlights Zizek's account of the difference between desire and drive. Both desire and drive designate relations to jouissance, that is the economies through which the subject structures her enjoyment. Zizek considers the difference between desire and drive via a change in the position and function of objet petit a. Zizek points out that drive's compulsive force captures the subject. Zizek's activization of drive mobilizes the category for political economy as it highlights drive as a compulsive, reflexive circuit that captures the subject and whose repetitions can intensify to points of destruction and rupture.
