Since we became capital: genealogies of the transformation of labor as subjectification and civilization in contemporary societies

Abstract

This paper addresses the transformation of labor as a horizon of political subjectification through its main figures and metamorphosis in the history of contemporary capitalism. Focusing on its related shifts, this research aims to unfold its displacement as a primordial vortex in the fight for social justice. Labor is regarded from its inaugural establishment as a subjectification central process in Marx's political theory to its current apparent loss of relevance for the political left thinking in favour of other ways and movements of social struggle. To this end, the paper approaches the contradictions denoted on Marx theories based on its historical-political facticity by post-Marxist criticism as well as the reterritorialization placed on Marxian work conception by global market neoliberalism. Therefore and in this sense, different approaches belonging to post-Marxism, post-structuralism, autonomism, operaism or leftist cultural criticism have been here addressed, despite their divergence. Finally, it is analysed the transformation carried out on work by neoliberal thought, and very particularly from the theory of "human capital", regarding its effect as the possibility of the emergence of these new flows of social movements as politically capable organizations, based on the expansion of the political field that equally expands its revolutionary powers.