Marx, Globalization and Alienation: Received and Underappreciated Wisdoms

At the World Congress of Sociology in 2006, the official rationale for re-examining `alienation' within a global context was that alienating factory work has now been eradicated, humanized and/or simply compensated for by high levels of consumption in post-industrialized societies, with alienation from work having been `exported' to offices there and sweatshops in newly industrializing countries. However, alienation from work in industrially …