Totally administered heteronomy: Adorno on work, leisure, and politics in the age of digital capitalism
Totally administered heteronomy: Adorno on work, leisure, and politics in the age of digital capitalism
This paper aims to demonstrate the contemporary relevance of Adorno’s thought for business ethicists working in the critical tradition by showing how his critique of modern social life anticipated, and offers continuing illumination of, recent technological transformations of capitalism. It develops and extrapolates Adorno’s thought regarding three central spheres of modern society, which have seen radical changes in light of recent technological developments: work, in which employee monitoring has become ever more sophisticated and intrusive; leisure consumption, in which the algorithmic developments of the culture industry have paved the way for entertainment products to dominate us; and political discourse, in which social media has exacerbated the anti-democratic tendencies Adorno warned of in the mid-twentieth century. We conclude by presenting, as a rejoinder to these developments, the contours of an Adornian ethics of resistance to the reification and dehumanisation of such developments.
Adorno, Consumerism, Critical Theory, Political discourse, Technology, Work
Reeves, Craig
f7333fa5-08d9-4aec-8cfd-aef43a2a163f
Sinnicks, Matthew
63b27aef-8672-4fa7-b2fa-388c9af51c57
Reeves, Craig
f7333fa5-08d9-4aec-8cfd-aef43a2a163f
Sinnicks, Matthew
63b27aef-8672-4fa7-b2fa-388c9af51c57
Reeves, Craig and Sinnicks, Matthew
(2023)
Totally administered heteronomy: Adorno on work, leisure, and politics in the age of digital capitalism.
Journal of Business Ethics.
(doi:10.1007/s10551-023-05570-2).
Abstract
This paper aims to demonstrate the contemporary relevance of Adorno’s thought for business ethicists working in the critical tradition by showing how his critique of modern social life anticipated, and offers continuing illumination of, recent technological transformations of capitalism. It develops and extrapolates Adorno’s thought regarding three central spheres of modern society, which have seen radical changes in light of recent technological developments: work, in which employee monitoring has become ever more sophisticated and intrusive; leisure consumption, in which the algorithmic developments of the culture industry have paved the way for entertainment products to dominate us; and political discourse, in which social media has exacerbated the anti-democratic tendencies Adorno warned of in the mid-twentieth century. We conclude by presenting, as a rejoinder to these developments, the contours of an Adornian ethics of resistance to the reification and dehumanisation of such developments.
Text
Reeves & Sinnicks - 2023 - TAH (AM)
- Accepted Manuscript
Text
s10551-023-05570-2
- Version of Record
More information
Accepted/In Press date: 27 October 2023
e-pub ahead of print date: 28 November 2023
Additional Information:
Publisher Copyright:
© 2023, The Author(s).
Keywords:
Adorno, Consumerism, Critical Theory, Political discourse, Technology, Work
Identifiers
Local EPrints ID: 483805
URI: http://eprints.soton.ac.uk/id/eprint/483805
ISSN: 0167-4544
PURE UUID: 5768e26b-bcf4-49cb-ba70-7579a5b016ab
Catalogue record
Date deposited: 06 Nov 2023 18:04
Last modified: 18 Mar 2024 04:06
Export record
Altmetrics
Contributors
Author:
Craig Reeves
Author:
Matthew Sinnicks
Download statistics
Downloads from ePrints over the past year. Other digital versions may also be available to download e.g. from the publisher's website.
View more statistics