Notes on the [necessary] relationship between subjectivation and capitalist power

Abstract

A recurring issue in Marxist approaches to the study of the relationship between subjectivity and work is the question of how capitalist power shapes individuals in the current historical context. In this work, we argue that the link between power and subjectivation is historically contingent, while specifically capitalist power necessarily demands mechanisms of subjectivation due to its historical conditions. Only in the capitalist mode of organizing social metabolism is the generalized production of subjects necessary with two main objectives in mind: (1) self-generating the conditions of existence for its reproduction as a system, and (2) ensuring private accumulation in the form of capital. These objectives require a specific form of power, namely, as social domination through an impersonal logic. This particularity distinguishes capitalism from previous modes of production and is based on capital's ability to insert itself into the gap between life and its conditions of possibility. Therefore, if we can show that the mechanisms of subjectivation depend on the historical conditions of the capitalist mode of production, then it is fair to think that the way out of this paradigm requires the necessary overcoming of such a social formation.