Critique of technical rationality is one of the main lines of the evolution of Western Marxist theory, and its generation and development have profound theoretical origins and social foundations. The inherent characteristics of modern technology and the external conditions of large-scale social production (globalization) have made humanistic reflection and criticism of science and technology one of the hidden or explicit themes for nearly a century and a half. Throughout more than one hundred years of Marxist humanistic reflections on science and technology, it shows the evolution path from alienated labor theory, materialization theory, technical rational criticism to technical practical labor.
Based on Hegel's "Dialectics of Master and Slave", Marx systematically expounded the theory of alienated labor in "Manuscript of Economics and Philosophy in 1844" (hereinafter referred to as "Manuscript"). As of the public publication of the Manuscript in the late 1920s, the theory of alienated labor contained in it became an important theoretical source for the development of Western Marxism, which prompted the birth and development of the technical critical logic of Western Marxism.
The theory of alienated labor has a significant background, especially in major capitalist countries. The development and completion of large-scale machinery industry presents the fact that technological innovation has caused the overall technology to be broken down into various machine tools and products. The production is also broken down into multiple processes, which directly leads to changes in the way people work. Workers have become "machines" on the production line, and modern technology has become a new shackle that binds workers. For the essence of machine restraint, Marx made a detailed explanation in the theory of "labor duality". From the production process of capital, he revealed the mechanism of machine production to promote capital proliferation and the essence of controlling workers' labor.
Lukács, one of the founders of Western Marxism, borrowed Marx's commodity fetishism in "History and Class Consciousness" to explain his concept of materialization, which opened a critique of advanced industrial society. Lukács defines the phenomenon of materialization as follows: "Man’s own activities (labor) have become objective, something that is not transferred by one’s own will, and has become dependent on people’s self-discipline to control people. "Something of this kind." Based on such a phenomenon of materialization, Lukács places his own theoretical starting point in the dilemma of criticizing the survival of modern people, which is in essence consistent with Marx's theory of alienated labor. The difference is that the subject of Lukács’s criticism extends from the economic field to the political ideology. He “combines materialization with the rationalization process of modern society, revealing the negative effects of technological rationality on the development of human subjectivity. The materialization of modern society". In this way, whether it is alienation or reification, the root of the problem is returned to the enlightenment rational spirit of modern society and to the technological rational spirit. Based on this, the Frankfurt School, an important school of Western Marxism, opened the criticism of technical rationality.
Starting from the 1930s, Horkheimer and Adorno started from Weber’s rationalization theory, combined with the theory of materialization and alienation, and put forward a rational critique of technical tools, starting the journey of critique of technical rationality. As for the Dialectics of Enlightenment, they returned to the beginning of modern society and criticized the rationality advocated by the Western Enlightenment, revealing the price of human social progress. They borrowed the "Odysseus myth" to trace the "true principles of Western civilization" and tried to deconstruct instrumental rationality through the approach of historical interpretation.
Marcuse published "On the Basis of Historical Materialism" shortly after the publication of "Manuscript". This work focuses on explaining Marx's theory of alienation and criticizing the cultural dilemma of contemporary humans. In Marcuse's view, with the development of modern society, technological progress continues to reshape social life, technological rationality has become a new ruling force, and technological political rule has become an indisputable fact. As a technology governed by social politics, people living in a technological society are transformed into one-dimensional people. Based on this, Marcuse put forward a famous thesis: "Technical progress = growth of social wealth = expansion of slavery", he used this to reveal the two sides of technological progress and technological rational development. Therefore, he advocated that in order to get rid of the established slavery in modern society, workers must criticize the rationality of governance brought about by the rationality of technology, and criticize the rational spirit represented by modern technology.
is different from the early Frankfurt scholars. In the 1990s, a new generation of scholar Feinberg combined the views of Marcuse and others in his book "Technical Critical Theory", returning to Marx’s practical logic, and proposed "a criticism of technical design ". Through a specific analysis of technical design cases (distance education technology), he clarified that the development of technology is jointly determined by technical standards and social standards. In other words, Feinberg will solve the problems caused by technology.The topic is placed on the "experience turn of technological research", and then avoid the negative effects of technology in advance, achieve harmonious coexistence between man and the environment, and finally realize the all-round development of man. In other words, the Frankfurt School represented by Horkheimer, Adorno, Marcuse and Feinberg inherited the critical spirit of Marxism, admired reflective enlightenment and critical instrumental rationality. However, the approach after the criticism, namely how to reconstruct modernity, was not answered by the early Frankfurt scholars. Although Feinberg later proposed that technical criticism should return to the context of technical design, he still failed to effectively solve the problem. The deconstruction of technical rationality and the liberation of labor are unified, and need to return to the context of technical practice.
Marx sublates the alienation of modern technology into the labor theory, thereby realizing the liberation of mankind. In "Das Kapital", Marx explained the relationship between man and nature on the basis of "labor", pointing out that labor "is the process of material transformation between man and nature caused, adjusted and controlled by man's own activities." "Purposeful activities" are the process by which workers use labor materials to transform labor objects. In Marx's view, what workers directly grasp is the means of labor. From "body organs" to "natural objects themselves becoming natural limbs", people become "tool-making animals." In Marx's view, the "use of the machine" is more important than the "machine itself", which means that "the meaning of the machine is not the machine itself, but what people do with the machine." At the same time, Marx also saw the inherent consistency between the use of machines and the proliferation of capital. He regarded machines as "fixed capital."
Through Marx's analysis, we find that from the beginning of the birth of mankind to the present, the evolution of technology has been accompanied by human development. Therefore, practical labor can also be called technical practical labor. Based on Marx’s theoretical logic, technical practical labor can be defined as a triple context: first, technical practical labor is different from animal activities, which transforms apes into humans; second, technical practical labor liberates people from the constraints of natural forces It turns out that some people are transformed into one-dimensional people in modern society; third, technical practice labor transforms people from the relationship between people and society, people and people, and people and themselves by changing social systems, changing communication methods, and improving the realm of thought. Liberated from the shackles of (a free and fully developed person). Criticism of technical rationality will eventually return to technical practice labor. This return makes people truly become a free and comprehensive being.
Source: China Daily of Social Sciences: LIU BAOJIE
(Author: Qufu Normal University School of Marxism)
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