DOCSLIB.ORG

Capital's Media: the Physical Conditions of Circulation

Total Page：16

File Type：pdf, Size：1020Kb

Download full-text PDF Read full-text
Capital's Media: the Physical Conditions of Circulation Western University Scholarship@Western Electronic Thesis and Dissertation Repository 9-26-2016 12:00 AM Capital's Media: The Physical Conditions of Circulation Atle Mikkola Kjøsen The University of Western Ontario Supervisor Dr. Nick Dyer-Witheford The University of Western Ontario Graduate Program in Media Studies A thesis submitted in partial fulfillment of the equirr ements for the degree in Doctor of Philosophy © Atle Mikkola Kjøsen 2016 Follow this and additional works at: https://ir.lib.uwo.ca/etd Part of the Film and Media Studies Commons Recommended Citation Kjøsen, Atle Mikkola, "Capital's Media: The Physical Conditions of Circulation" (2016). Electronic Thesis and Dissertation Repository. 4156. https://ir.lib.uwo.ca/etd/4156 This Dissertation/Thesis is brought to you for free and open access by Scholarship@Western. It has been accepted for inclusion in Electronic Thesis and Dissertation Repository by an authorized administrator of Scholarship@Western. For more information, please contact [email protected]. Abstract The question of what constitutes media has received little attention in Marxism and where it does, the concept is an empty abstraction. While Marxists have extensively theorized the concentration of mass media ownership, and analyzed mass media content as ideology or propaganda, critical discussions of what a medium is in the capitalist mode of production have been mostly lacking. That is to say, Marxism does not have a media ontology. Media is therefore a critical gap in Marx’s political economy. This dissertation seeks to fill this gap by asking what is a medium in the capitalist mode of production?, answering it with a value- form theory of media and a concept of “capital’s media” that takes the circulation of capital as its starting point. The dissertation goes beyond Marxism’s mass media myopia and moves the concept of media towards logistics and infrastructure. The contributions this dissertation makes are to (1) develop a theory and category of capital’s media as a phenomenon of the circulation process of capital; (2) stake out an approach to investigate media phenomenon outside of pure political economy and cultural studies approaches; and in the process (3) contribute towards a rehabilitation of Marx’s analysis of circulation. To make these contributions this dissertation relies on a theoretical framework that is primarily based on Marx’s value theory, but enriched with concepts from Canadian- German media theory (Harold A. Innis, Marshall McLuhan, Friedrich Kittler, Wolfgang Ernst, and Hartmut Winkler) and Paul Virilio’s dromology. This dissertation has two components to its methodology: an original “circulationist” reading of Marx’s political economy that is developed from the heterodox Neue Marx-Lektüre (New Marx Reading), and a set of empirical case studies that includes the shipping container and intermodal transportation, distribution centers, and point-of-sale and payment systems Positing a category of capital’s media, this dissertation concludes that nothing by its very nature is a medium but instead that things function as media when they appear in that category. More specifically, a thing, such as a container ship or distribution center, appears in the category of capital’s media when they function within and for the circulation process. i Keywords Marxism, Media Studies, Media Theory, Marx, Political Economy of Media, Value Form Theory, Circulation, Movement, Logistics, Intermodal Transportation, Distribution Centers, Point-of-sale systems. ii Acknowledgments While writing a dissertation can be quite lonely, it is not something that can be done alone. I am heavily indebted to my supervisors, teachers, colleagues, friends, and family for guidance, moral support, and being there for me during those times when I got the graduate school blues. At the outset, I want to stress my sincere thanks to all of you mentioned below. First and foremost, I want to thank my supervisor Nick Dyer-Witheford for his continuing support and encouragement, and, like a true sage, always coming with advice that put me on the right track even when I felt completely lost. Our many talks about Marxism, value theory, logistics, and what a medium is when it comes to capital provided plenty of fuel for this dissertation. Nick’s constructive feedback as my research has developed has truly been wonderful. I originally decided to come to UWO and FIMS to work with Nick after reading Cyber-Marx; it proved to definitively be the right choice. He has always been very supportive of the projects I have been working on, giving me courage to pursue lines of thinking and avenues of research that more orthodox Marxists would likely have shut down. The paper I consider to be the highlight of my graduate career—“Do Androids Dream of Surplus-Value?”— could have been written only under his influence and for a course in which he was the instructor. As a scholar, teacher, and writer Nick is a role model; if I can reach half of his academic stature I would feel quite accomplished. I also want to thank Nick for being a friend and our many conversations about science fiction and Lovecraftian horror, and for providing the theater of war for the crowned heads of Europe. I also thank my second reader, MA thesis supervisor, and good friend Bernd Frohmann. Without the supervision, mentorship, and encouragement from Bernd this dissertation would not have seen the light of day. It was first through Bernd’s excellent Media Philosophies seminar that I got my first academic exposure to media theorists like McLuhan, Virilio, and Kittler. And it was in this seminar that I first started exploring the connections between Marx and Canadian-German media theory. I will remember fondly the many conversations and MA thesis editing sessions we had at his house. Bernd also acted as a center of gravity for graduate students interested in media theory; many exciting reading groups took root around him, and he was a generous host for many reading group sessions. iii I express thanks for the thoughtful feedback and critiques form my examination committee: Brett Caraway, Tobias Nagel, Edward Comor, and Bernd Frohmann. I really enjoyed our respective discussions during the defense; you made the experience fun. I thank the many different people that have taken part in one or several of the multiple reading groups I have taken part in during my graduate studies. First of all I thank the unofficial media theory reading group, which has involved Vincent Manzerolle, Henry Svec, Liam Young, Dusty Cohen, and Warren Steele. You are some of the smartest and funniest people I know. To the many people that have at some point been involved in one of the many Das Kapital reading groups, you are part of the foundation for my close engagement with the good book; I thank in particular Vincent Manzerolle, Henry Svec, Trent Cruz, Owen Livermore, and Kyle Asquith for being in that first reading group that finally made me get through Das Kapital after many failed attempts. I also thank Svitlana Matviyenko for starting the Lacan reading group, and for several intense one-on-one sessions for our psychoanalysis, AI and cybernetics reading group. And to James Steinhoff for a very interesting, albeit short- lived, reading group on accelerationism. These reading groups have been some of the most interesting, challenging, fun, and intellectually stimulating things I have done while at Western and for that I thank everyone that made them that. Throughout the eight years I have spent at the Faculty of Information and Media Studies (FIMS), I have met many teachers and colleagues that have, in one way or another, contributed to my intellectual and professional development and therefore deserve thanks. Edward Comor for introducing me to Innis and for being a good Marxist sparring partner; Alison Hearn for her great course The Commodity and the Self, which was equally challenging and rewarding, and has left a clear trace on my thinking about subjectivity, determination, and above all reality television; Carole Farber for instructing me in anthropology and feminist approaches to media studies, and in general for being kind and supportive; Tim Blackmore for being an ally in departmental meetings and for good chats about Virilio and science fiction. I want to especially thank Susan Knabe for being a great teacher, but in particular for having my back and being genuinely kind and supportive of students. iv I thank the staff in FIMS for doing work that mostly goes unnoticed, but without which it would be impossible for any graduate student to complete their studies. In particular I thank Cindy Morrison, Lili Dang and Matt Ward. You have been kind, and supportive. Friends and colleagues have offered both inspiration, support, and companionship. For someone who has struggled with social anxiety and has never been good with social conventions, you have kept inviting me out to socialize, helped my cats when they were sick or I was away, and just been in general been great. I owe special thanks to Vincent Manzerolle, Trent Cruz, Jill McTavish, Tiara Sukhan, Liam Young, Giles Whitaker, Henry Svec, Warren Steele, Lili Dang, Matt Ward, Michael Daubs, Lee McGuigan, Gemma Richardson, Estee Fresco, Eileen Wennekers, Luke Arnott, Jason Netherton, Patrick Gavin, Ahmed Kamal, Rachel Mellis, Elise Thorburn, Kamilla Pietrzyk, Nandita Biswas Mellamphy, Dan Mellamphy, and Svitlana Matviyenko, David Jackson, Jamie Campbell, and Danielle Tascherau Manners. To my non-academic friends and comrades in our London affinity group: Sean, Mike, Awasis, Will, and Bailey you have kept me sane and forced me to have at least one foot outside the ivory tower. The many undergraduate students I have taught also deserve a thanks. I did not know that I loved teaching until I had the pleasure of being a teaching assistant and then instructor in the MIT and MPI programs.
Load more

Recommended publications
  • Key Texts and Contributions to a Critical Theory of Society
    1 Introduction: Key Texts and Contributions to a Critical Theory of Society Beverley Best, Werner Bonefeld and Chris O’Kane The designation of the Frankfurt School as a known by sympathisers as ‘Café Marx’. It ‘critical theory’ originated in the United was the first Marxist research institute States. It goes back to two articles, one writ- attached to a German University. ten by Max Horkheimer and the other by Since the 1950s, ‘Frankfurt School’ criti- Herbert Marcuse, that were both published in cal theory has become an established, inter- Zeitschrift für Sozialforschung (later Studies nationally recognised ‘brand name’ in the in Philosophy and Social Science) in 1937.1 social and human sciences, which derives The Zeitschrift, published from 1932 to from its institutional association in the 1920s 1941, was the publishing organ of the and again since 1951 with the Institute Institute for Social Research. It gave coher- for Social Research in Frankfurt, (West) ence to what in fact was an internally diverse Germany. From this institutional perspec- and often disagreeing group of heterodox tive, it is the association with the Institute Marxists that hailed from a wide disciplinary that provides the basis for what is considered spectrum, including social psychology critical theory and who is considered to be a (Fromm, Marcuse, Horkheimer), political critical theorist. This Handbook works with economy and state formation (Pollock and and against its branded identification, concre- Neumann), law and constitutional theory tising as well as refuting it. (Kirchheimer, Neumann), political science We retain the moniker ‘Frankfurt School’ (Gurland, Neumann), philosophy and sociol- in the title to distinguish the character of its ogy (Adorno, Horkheimer, Marcuse), culture critical theory from other seemingly non- (Löwenthal, Adorno), musicology (Adorno), traditional approaches to society, including aesthetics (Adorno, Löwenthal, Marcuse) the positivist traditions of Marxist thought, and social technology (Gurland, Marcuse).
    [Show full text]
  • Strategies for the Latin American Left Problems of Autonomism by CLAUDIO KATZ
    Strategies for the Latin American Left Problems of Autonomism by CLAUDIO KATZ SINCE THE mid-1990s, autonomist politics has gained influence in Latin America. Its theorists are attentively listened to and their practical proposals awaken great interest. But this scenario has begun to change with the appearance of new nationalist and center-left governments. The rise of Lula, Kirchner, and Tabaré, the increased strength of Chávez, the resurgence of Fidel, and the shift of López Obrador changes the playing field that favored the expansion of libertarian theories. The autonomists eschew political affiliation and ideological definition. They share feelings, attitudes, and projects, but they do not support a common doctrine. They broadcast a moral critique of capitalism from an anti-authoritarian perspective, rejecting all forms of leadership and state power. They use a libertarian language and defend autoorganización [self-organization], emphasizing values of solidarity and community. They question participation in mainstream institutions and encourage autogestión [self- management] in the economic sphere. But the autonomists are a very heterogeneous group and lack recognized spokespeople as common proponents of their vision. In order to frame the debate, it is necessary to select certain authors who express this political current’s most relevant theories. Zibechicocaleros [coca growers], and the Argentine piqueteros [the unemployed workers’ movement]. In terms of theory, Negri The Argentine laboratory The popular uprising of 2001–2003 in Argentina was a particularly relevant experience for the autonomists because they concluded that their project was beginning to take shape in the organizations emerging during this rebellion. They presented the neighborhood assemblies and the piquetero protests as examples of a new emancipatory autoorganización and extended this assessment to the bartering clubs (where workers and farmers exchanged goods and services without cash), the reoccupied factories, and the counter-cultural collectives.
    [Show full text]
  • Exodus General Idea of the Revolution in the XXI Century
    Exodus General Idea of the Revolution in the XXI Century Kevin A. Carson 2021 Contents Reviews 5 Abstract 6 Preface 7 Part One: Background 8 Chapter One: The Age of Mass and Maneuver 9 I. A Conflict of Visions .................................... 9 II. The Triumph of Mass in the Old Left .......................... 15 III. The Assault on Working Class Agency ......................... 42 IV. Workerism/Laborism .................................. 49 Chapter Two: Transition 52 I. Drastic Reductions in Necessary Outlays for the Means of Production . 52 II. The Network Revolution and the Imploding Cost of Coordination . 57 III. The Impotence of Enforcement, and Superiority of Circumvention to Resistance . 70 IV. Superior General Efficiency and Low Overhead .................... 74 V. Conclusion ......................................... 78 Part Two. The Age of Exodus 79 Chapter Three: Horizontalism and Self-Activity Over Vanguard Institutions 80 Introduction ......................................... 80 I. The New Left ........................................ 81 II. Autonomism ........................................ 90 III. The 1968 Movements and the Transition to Horizontalist Praxis . 98 IV. The Post-1994 Movements ................................ 100 Chapter Four: The Abandonment of Workerism 115 I. The Limited Relevance of Proletarianism in the Mass Production Age . 115 II. Technology and the Declining Relevance of Proletarianism . 116 III The Abandonment of Proletarianism by the New Left . 117 IV. The Abandonment of Workerism in Praxis . 127 Chapter Five: Evolutionary Transition Models 131 Introduction and Note on Terminology . 131 2 I. Comparison to Previous Systemic Transitions . 132 II. The Nature of Post-Capitalist Transition . 146 Chapter Six: Interstitial Development and Exodus over Insurrection 157 Introduction ......................................... 157 I. The Split Within Autonomism .............................. 159 II. The Shift From the Factory to Society as the Main Locus of Productivity .
    [Show full text]
  • Interpreting Marx's Theory of the State and Opposition to Anarchism
    Interpreting Marx's Theory of the State and Opposition to Anarchism Though Marx intended to dedicate a volume of Capital to the question of 'the State', he died before he could even begin that work. We are, therefore, left to reconstruct the 'Marxist theory of the state' from scattered references littered throughout Marx and Engels' collected works. My analysis investigates the shifts and contradictions in their thought, as well as the utility these contradictions served in misrepresenting the anarchist alternative. By Matthew Crossin “… no state, howsoever democratic its forms, not even the reddest political republic… is capable of giving the people what they need: the free organisation of their own interests from below upward…" - Mikhail Bakunin, Statism and Anarchy, p. 24 “[With the abolition of classes] the power of the State, which serves to keep the great majority of the producers under the yoke of the numerically small exploiting minority, disappears, and the functions of government are transformed into simple administrative functions. [The anarchists] put matters the other way round…” - Karl Marx & Friedrich Engels, Fictitious Splits in the International, p. 74 1 Marxism, Anarchism, and the State The purpose of this essay is to reassess the views of Karl Marx, his close partner Friedrich Engels, and their anarchist contemporaries on the crucial question of ‘the State’.2 Specifically, I contend that dominant interpretations of Marx have unsatisfactorily addressed his varied and contradictory analysis of the State; its role (if any) in the construction of a socialist society; and the ways in which this has both overlapped and come into conflict with the anarchist view.
    [Show full text]
  • Second Ole Lando Memorial Lecture September 2020 Contract Law and Human Dignity Christian Von Bar, Osnabrück
    1 Second Ole Lando Memorial Lecture September 2020 Contract Law and Human Dignity Christian von Bar, Osnabrück I. Introduction Ole Lando was interested in the law governing commercial contracts. This second lecture held in his memory (Professor Hugh Beale hold the first one year ago in Copenhagen) will, as I promised to his sons, also be about contract law, but it will not be about commercial contracts. Rather, I have decided to direct my (and hopefully your) attention to those aspects of contract law which are directly affected by fundamental and human rights law. At first sight one might think that the one and the other only rarely get into conflict. Agreements are normally seen as something “good”; how can they clash with human rights? But I hope to be able to show that on closer analysis there is a lot to be said about agreements which for mainly or at least predominantly constitutional reasons cannot be held up as binding contracts. II. Persons My subject is closely connected with the law governing the natural (or physical) person. Such a “person” is a human being who, within the framework of private law, deals with other human beings (and so-called “legal persons”). It is about the “public face” of the human being. Persona was the mask of an actor by which one could recognize the character he played and which helped to better understand his voice. A human being appears as a person when he or she comes into contact with other subjects of private law and puts on his or her “character mask” for this purpose.
    [Show full text]
  • Fetishism and Revolution in the Critique of Political Economy
    CONTINENTAL THOUGHT & THEORY: A JOURNAL OF INTELLECTUAL FREEDOM Fetishism and Revolution in the Critique of Political Economy Volume 1 | Issue 4: 150 years of Capital 365-398 | ISSN: 2463-333X Fetishism and Revolution in the Critique of Political Economy: Critical Reflections on some Contemporary Readings of Marx’s Capital Guido Starosta Abstract The aim of this article is to examine a series of recent contributions to the reading of Marx’s Capital that stress its specific determination as a dialectical investigation of objectified or fetishised forms of social mediation in capitalist society: on the one hand, the so-called Neue Marx-Lektüre originated in Germany towards the end of the 1960s and, on the other, the more widely circulated work of authors associated with so-called Open Marxism. The interesting aspect of these works is that they draw the implications of Marx’s critique of political economy not only for the comprehension of the fetishised forms of social objectivity in capitalism, but also for the comprehension of the forms of subjectivity of the modern individual. More specifically, all these contributions broadly share the insightful view that the content of the simplest determination of human individuality in the capitalist mode of production is its alienated existence as ‘personification of economic categories’. However, this article 365 CONTINENTAL THOUGHT & THEORY: A JOURNAL OF INTELLECTUAL FREEDOM Fetishism and Revolution in the Critique of Political Economy argues that the limits of these perspectives become apparent when it comes to uncovering the grounds of the revolutionary form of subjectivity which carries the potentiality to transcend capitalist alienation.
    [Show full text]
  • Agrarian Anarchism and Authoritarian Populism: Towards a More (State-)Critical ‘Critical Agrarian Studies’
    The Journal of Peasant Studies ISSN: 0306-6150 (Print) 1743-9361 (Online) Journal homepage: https://www.tandfonline.com/loi/fjps20 Agrarian anarchism and authoritarian populism: towards a more (state-)critical ‘critical agrarian studies’ Antonio Roman-Alcalá To cite this article: Antonio Roman-Alcalá (2020): Agrarian anarchism and authoritarian populism: towards a more (state-)critical ‘critical agrarian studies’, The Journal of Peasant Studies, DOI: 10.1080/03066150.2020.1755840 To link to this article: https://doi.org/10.1080/03066150.2020.1755840 © 2020 The Author(s). Published by Informa UK Limited, trading as Taylor & Francis Group Published online: 20 May 2020. Submit your article to this journal Article views: 3209 View related articles View Crossmark data Citing articles: 4 View citing articles Full Terms & Conditions of access and use can be found at https://www.tandfonline.com/action/journalInformation?journalCode=fjps20 THE JOURNAL OF PEASANT STUDIES https://doi.org/10.1080/03066150.2020.1755840 FORUM ON AUTHORITARIAN POPULISM AND THE RURAL WORLD Agrarian anarchism and authoritarian populism: towards a more (state-)critical ‘critical agrarian studies’* Antonio Roman-Alcalá International Institute of Social Studies, The Hague, Netherlands ABSTRACT KEYWORDS This paper applies an anarchist lens to agrarian politics, seeking to Anarchism; authoritarian expand and enhance inquiry in critical agrarian studies. populism; critical agrarian Anarchism’s relevance to agrarian processes is found in three studies; state theory; social general areas: (1) explicitly anarchist movements, both historical movements; populism; United States of America; and contemporary; (2) theories that emerge from and shape these moral economy movements; and (3) implicit anarchism found in values, ethics, everyday practices, and in forms of social organization – or ‘anarchistic’ elements of human social life.
    [Show full text]
  • Communization and Its Discontents
    Minor Compositions Open Access Statement – Please Read This book is open access. This work is not simply an electronic book; it is the open access version of a work that exists in a number of forms, the traditional printed form being one of them. All Minor Compositions publications are placed for free, in their entirety, on the web. This is because the free and autonomous sharing of knowledges and experiences is important, especially at a time when the restructuring and increased centralization of book distribution makes it difficult (and expensive) to distribute radical texts effectively. The free posting of these texts does not mean that the necessary energy and labor to produce them is no longer there. One can think of buying physical copies not as the purchase of commodities, but as a form of support or solidarity for an approach to knowledge production and engaged research (particularly when purchasing directly from the publisher). The open access nature of this publication means that you can: • read and store this document free of charge • distribute it for personal use free of charge • print sections of the work for personal use • read or perform parts of the work in a context where no financial transactions take place However, it is against the purposes of Minor Compositions open access approach to: • gain financially from the work • sell the work or seek monies in relation to the distribution of the work • use the work in any commercial activity of any kind • profit a third party indirectly via use or distribution of the work • distribute in or through a commercial body (with the exception of academic usage within educational institutions) The intent of Minor Compositions as a project is that any surpluses generated from the use of collectively produced literature are intended to return to further the development and production of further publications and writing: that which comes from the commons will be used to keep cultivating those commons.
    [Show full text]
  • Rising with the Robots: Towards a Human-Machine Autonomy for Digital Socialism
    tripleC 18(1): 67-83, 2020 http://www.triple-c.at Rising With the Robots: Towards a Human-Machine Autonomy for Digital Socialism Christopher M. Cox The University of Akron, Akron, OH, USA, [email protected] Abstract: This essay is concerned with conceptualising digital socialism in two ways. First, this essay typifies digital socialism as a real utopian project bringing together the utopian po- tential of “full automation” as tied to socio-economic imperatives indicative of socialist aims. Second, in recognition of a critical gap between full automation and an emerging technological autonomy, this essay argues for a human-machine autonomy that situates autonomy as a shared condition among humans and machines. By conceiving of humans and automated technologies as autonomous subject aligned against capital, pursuing the aims of digital so- cialism can anticipate and avoid capitalist ideologies that hinders possibilities for autonomous pursuit of digital socialism. Keywords: digital socialism, robots, robotics, fully-automated communism, full automation, human-machine autonomy, Autonomist Marxism, Autonomism 1. Introduction This essay attempts to answer the question “how do recent debates about ‘full auto- mation’ and postcapitalist socioeconomics establish a foundation for conceptualizing digital socialism?” Since 2015, debates about socialism have exhibited a resurgence among public consciousness and electoral politics in the western world. From the election of “Marx- admiring socialist” (Danner 2015) Jeremy Corbyn as leader of the UK Labour Party to successive Bernie Sanders U.S. presidential campaigns foregrounding “democratic socialism” as a series of comprehensive socio-economic reforms aimed at creating an economy that “works for all, not just the very wealthy” (Frizell 2015) to the surge of 13,000 new members and 100 new chapters of the Democratic Socialists of America (DSA) (Schwartz 2017), “socialism” is increasingly mobilized by political actors.
    [Show full text]
  • Fromm and Horkheimer – on the Fundamentals of Critical Theory's
    42 Articles Fromm and Horkheimer – On the fundamentals of critical theory’s anthropology 1 Fábio De Maria Abstract: Erich Fromm was central to the Frank- furt Institute for Social Research under the di- rection of Max Horkheimer, but the works of each author, while handling at times similar is- sues, took different paths. The article’s aim is to analyze how Horkheimer’s anthropology, which would be of importance in Dialectic of Enlighten- ment, was built as the author critically embodied the core elements of his colleague’s social psy- chology in his essays. By doing so, Horkheimer could overcome some of the limitations of Fromm’s early work, as well as suggest new ways for critique. Keywords: critical theory; anthropology; character; Max Horkheimer; Erich Fromm; domination. 1 This text was first published (with the same title and – except for corrections, small chan- ges and a larger paragraph in one of the last pages – with exact the same content) in Bajo Palabra, Revista de Filosofía, II Época, n. 21, 2019, pp. 59–80. I would like to thank Ema- nuel Kapfinger for discussing several aspects of Fromm’s and Horkheimer’s social theo- ries with me. I also thank Rainer Funk, Thomas Kühn, Catherine Silver, Neil McLaughlin and Lynn Chancer for debating this text at the 4th International Erich Fromm Seminar for Doctoral Students and Postdocs, held in Tübingen in September 2019 by the Erich Fromm Institut and the Erich Fromm Study Center. The article is based on ideas de- veloped in my doctoral thesis, Crítica da autoridade: dominação e emancipação na obra de Max Horkheimer (»Critique of authority: domination and emancipation in the work of Max Horkheimer«), supervised by Prof.
    [Show full text]
  • The Spectre of Anarchism
    the author(s) 2013 ISSN 1473-2866 (Online) ISSN 2052-1499 (Print) www.ephemerajournal.org volume 13(3): 675-681 The spectre of anarchism Thomas Swann review of Eden, D. (2012) Autonomy: Capitalism, class and politics. Ashgate: Surrey. (HB, pp.283, £54.00, ISBN 9781409411741) David Eden’s Autonomy: Capitalism, class and politics is the first book-length general study of autonomist Marxism, or what he calls ‘the perspective of autonomy’ (11). A large and detailed analysis, Eden’s book covers the work of three sub-traditions within autonomist thought, which he organizes geographically (across Italy, the US and the UK). He begins by discussing the ideas of Paolo Virno and Antonio Negri, before moving onto the authors grouped within the Midnight Notes Collective (MNC) and finishing with an appraisal of the work of John Holloway. Each section is divided into three chapters: two outlining the theories of the respective authors and a third offering several points of critique. Before moving on to discuss Eden’s project as a whole and to comment on it, it should be noted that these three sections, in so far as they hone in on specific lacunae or theoretical and practical problems Eden has with the authors he discusses, offers valuable critique of, and insights into, autonomist thought. As such, his book is an invaluable and timely intervention in debates around autonomist Marxism. One thing that stands out about the book, however, is that these three sections at times read like three unconnected studies. While the conclusion and the themes Eden focuses on do bring them together, there is a sense, and I’ll return to this below, that the three sections don’t engage with one another as much as they perhaps could; i.e.
    [Show full text]
  • Human Material in the Communication of Capital Atle Mikkola Kjøsen University of Western Ontario, Faculty of Information and Media Studies, [email protected]
    communication +1 Volume 2 Article 3 Issue 1 Communication and New Materialism September 2013 Human Material in the Communication of Capital Atle Mikkola Kjøsen University of Western Ontario, Faculty of Information and Media Studies, [email protected] Abstract The purpose of this article is to interrogate Marx’s analysis of the circulation of capital through the ‘new materialist’ communications and media theory of Friedrich Kittler. It explores the connections between Marx’s commodity fetish and how Kittler posits human beings as components of an information system alongside technologies and institutions. The article ask whether a ‘non-human’ Marxist theory is possible, i.e. if it is possible to remove the human being from its privileged position in Marx’s political economy. Specifically the paper argues that human beings are programmable human matter that serves to aid the communication of value through capital’s circuit. This stance necessitates adopting the point of view of capital and the fetish, bracketing the social and moving away from categories such as labour, production and class consciousness in favour of the value form, circulation and programmability. Keywords Karl Marx, Friedrich Kittler, Marxism, Value form, New materialism, Media theory, Communication, Programmability, Lacan, Subjectivity Human Material in the Communication of Capital Cover Page Footnote Acknowledgement: Thanks to Vincent Manzerolle, Bernd Frohmann, Julia Campbell and Nick Dyer-Witheford for reading and commenting on drafts of the paper, to Jordan Coop for helping designing the figures, and especially to Siobhan Watters for reading, editing and commenting on several versions of this paper. This article is available in communication +1: https://scholarworks.umass.edu/cpo/vol2/iss1/ 3 Kjøsen / Human Material, Communication and Capital We cannot know whether Pavlov's dogs can escape from their conditioned existence.
    [Show full text]