{"title":"What we may expect from work","authors":"Christian Schmidt","doi":"10.1177/1468795X231170762","DOIUrl":null,"url":null,"abstract":"In his critique of contemporary working conditions, Axel Honneth rejects Marx’s concept of alienation for three main reasons: (1) The concept is allegedly tied to industrial labor as the standard model of work. (2) The ideal of unalienated labor seems to be too demanding in its aspiration to the full development of all human potential. (3) The level of analysis is so fundamental that the critique loses the “ends in view,” that is, the feasible almerioation of actual working conditions. I argue that these three challenges can be met by a more charitable reading of Marx. Moreover, alienation helps us to identify structural reasons for the failure of approaches to improve working conditions in recent decades and provides analytical tools for the current crises of democracy.","PeriodicalId":1,"journal":{"name":"Accounts of Chemical Research","volume":null,"pages":null},"PeriodicalIF":16.4000,"publicationDate":"2023-04-26","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":"0","resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":null,"PeriodicalName":"Accounts of Chemical Research","FirstCategoryId":"1085","ListUrlMain":"https://doi.org/10.1177/1468795X231170762","RegionNum":1,"RegionCategory":"化学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":null,"EPubDate":"","PubModel":"","JCR":"Q1","JCRName":"CHEMISTRY, MULTIDISCIPLINARY","Score":null,"Total":0}
引用次数: 0
Abstract
In his critique of contemporary working conditions, Axel Honneth rejects Marx’s concept of alienation for three main reasons: (1) The concept is allegedly tied to industrial labor as the standard model of work. (2) The ideal of unalienated labor seems to be too demanding in its aspiration to the full development of all human potential. (3) The level of analysis is so fundamental that the critique loses the “ends in view,” that is, the feasible almerioation of actual working conditions. I argue that these three challenges can be met by a more charitable reading of Marx. Moreover, alienation helps us to identify structural reasons for the failure of approaches to improve working conditions in recent decades and provides analytical tools for the current crises of democracy.
期刊介绍:
Accounts of Chemical Research presents short, concise and critical articles offering easy-to-read overviews of basic research and applications in all areas of chemistry and biochemistry. These short reviews focus on research from the author’s own laboratory and are designed to teach the reader about a research project. In addition, Accounts of Chemical Research publishes commentaries that give an informed opinion on a current research problem. Special Issues online are devoted to a single topic of unusual activity and significance.
Accounts of Chemical Research replaces the traditional article abstract with an article "Conspectus." These entries synopsize the research affording the reader a closer look at the content and significance of an article. Through this provision of a more detailed description of the article contents, the Conspectus enhances the article's discoverability by search engines and the exposure for the research.