Labour Power: Virtual And Actual In Digital Production

Description

This book offers a critical account of Karl Marx’s dazzling theory of labour power which is also one of the most influential concepts in the history of contemporary philosophy. Labour power is the dark side of the digital revolution. Working men and women are invisible and treated like human service, flesh and blood automatons or organic extensions of a machine that produces data on its own. Automation is viewed as something magic made possible by algorithms whose life is independent of human beings. Labour power, however, has not disappeared. Without drivers, Uber cannot connect customers on its platform; without searches on its browser, Google grinds to a halt; without us, Facebook or Instagram is desert. Labour power is the dwarf hidden inside the puppet of technology that allows algorithms to be intelligent and make the biggest profits in the history of capitalism. The invisible centrality of labour power is the political enigma of our times. Today a new account of the theory of labour power is needed more than ever in order to understand the political economy of digital capitalism on new grounds. Unlike a long tradition in the history of work, labour power is not only the work or the data it produces, but a potency that does not coincide with its current commodification. The actuality of labour power does not exhaust the virtuality that can be actualised by its faculty. Even when reduced to a commodity, labour power does not exhaust the potency of its being otherwise. Immersed in the constant propaganda that boosts the latest technological inventions, we neglect the fact that this wealth is produced by us and that it could be ours precisely because it is a part of our potential to be other than what we are at present. This book is a vibrant invitation to consider the fact that we are always connected with the potency that is constantly at work in our life. If this were not the case, we would not be alive. If we do not strive to become consciously and collectively active, we will never know. Contents......Page 7 1.1 The Problem with “Power”......Page 9 1.2 Spinoza and Marx and the Theory of Labour-Power......Page 11 References......Page 14 2.1 The Dark Side of the Digital Revolution......Page 16 2.2 Brand New Future or Golden Age......Page 17 2.3 Human, Too Human: Capital......Page 19 2.4 Genealogy......Page 21 2.5 The Fifth Estate......Page 23 2.6 Intersection and Multipositionality......Page 26 2.7 The Faculty of Faculties......Page 28 2.8 Actual and Virtual......Page 31 References......Page 35 3.1 Labour-Power Does Not Grow on Trees......Page 37 3.2 Arbeitskraft/Labour-Power......Page 39 3.3 Arbeitsvermögen/Capacity to Work......Page 43 3.4 Living Personality......Page 45 3.5 Use......Page 49 3.6 Cooperation......Page 53 3.7 Reproduction......Page 56 3.8 Against Work......Page 59 3.9 Abstract Labour......Page 63 3.10 Living Labour......Page 67 3.11 The Hypothesis of Communism......Page 69 References......Page 72 4.1 Untameable......Page 75 4.2 Gladiators......Page 80 4.3 Self-employment Has No Friends......Page 84 4.4 Freelance Workers......Page 89 4.5 Flâneur......Page 93 References......Page 95 5.1 Amazon Mechanical Turk......Page 98 5.2 Californian Ideology......Page 101 5.3 The Myth of Automation......Page 103 5.4 Unmanned Cars and Other Stories......Page 106 5.5 Human Services in the Gig Economy......Page 111 5.6 Digital Work......Page 114 5.7 The Role of Platforms......Page 118 5.8 Total Mobilisation......Page 121 5.9 Work Has Not Ended, It Has Increased......Page 126 5.10 Beyond Surveillance Capitalism......Page 129 5.11 The Struggles for Rights......Page 132 5.12 Right to Existence......Page 134 References......Page 140 6.1 Becoming Startup......Page 148 6.2 Lifelong Managers......Page 150 6.3 Valuto Ergo Sum......Page 153 6.4 As You Wish, Master......Page 155 6.5 Psychological Contract......Page 157 6.6 Human Capital......Page 161 6.7 Liberation......Page 164 References......Page 169 Conclusions: What Can Labour-Power Do?......Page 172 References......Page 175 Index......Page 176