From Formal Subsumption to General Intellect: Elements for a Marxist Reading of the Thesis of Cognitive Capitalism, in Historical Materialism

Carlo Vercellone ()
Additional contact information
Carlo Vercellone: CES - Centre d'économie de la Sorbonne - UP1 - Université Paris 1 Panthéon-Sorbonne - CNRS - Centre National de la Recherche Scientifique

Post-Print from HAL

Abstract: Since the crisis of Fordism, capitalism has been characterised by the ever more central role ofknowledge and the rise of the cognitive dimensions of labour. This is not to say that the centralityof knowledge to capitalism is new per se. Rather, the question we must ask is to what extent we canspeak of a new role for knowledge and, more importantly, its relationship with transformations inthe capital/labour relation. From this perspective, the paper highlights the continuing validity ofMarx's analysis of the knowledge/power relation in the development of the division of labour. Moreprecisely, we are concerned with the theoretical and heuristic value of the concepts of formalsubsumption, real subsumption and general intellect for any interpretation of the present change ofthe capital/labour relation in cognitive capitalism. In this way, we show the originality of the generalintellect hypothesis as a sublation of real subsumption. Finally, the article summarises keycontradictions and new forms of antagonism in cognitive capitalism.

Keywords: crisis; division of labour; knowledge; formal subsumption; real subsumption; general intellect; cognitive capitalism; diffuse intellectuality (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2007-03
Note: View the original document on HAL open archive server: https://shs.hal.science/halshs-00263661
References: View references in EconPapers View complete reference list from CitEc
Citations: View citations in EconPapers (21)

Published in Historical Materialism, 2007, 15 (1), pp.13-36. ⟨10.1163/156920607X171681⟩

Downloads: (external link)
https://shs.hal.science/halshs-00263661/document (application/pdf)

Related works:
This item may be available elsewhere in EconPapers: Search for items with the same title.

Export reference: BibTeX RIS (EndNote, ProCite, RefMan) HTML/Text

Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:hal:journl:halshs-00263661

DOI: 10.1163/156920607X171681

Access Statistics for this paper

More papers in Post-Print from HAL
Bibliographic data for series maintained by CCSD ().