Andre Gorz on the Immaterial

* Book: Andre Gorz. L'Immateriel.

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An attempt to understand the era of 'cognitive capitalism', by one of the pre-eminent ecological thinkers in France.

Summary

From the reading notes of Michel Bauwens, 2005:

"Gorz distinguishes, following Husserl, 'lived experience', i.e. the pre-cognitive direct intuition of the lifeworld, from, 'knowledge about objects', which is socially validated through institutional learning. A society must be judged by how it uses the latter to enhance the former, i.e. the quality of life. These ideas were influential on the environmental movement, which should also be seen as a defense against the appropriation of the lifeworld, and not as a mere defense of 'nature'.

Gorz also distinguishes the logic of capital from the logic of science, they are both separate even though allied; he sees transhumanism, i.e. the desire for the full liberation from the limitations of the human and nature, as the ultimate essence of the logic of science.

He references Sloterdijk's distinction of auto-technics, for self-production, from hetero-technics, change imposed from the outside; as well as Illich, who distinguished convivial tools, those that do not program their users, while heteronomous tools do program and determine their users. Sloterdijk had argued that in the 'era of matter', the relation was one of dominance, nature had to be 'raped' as it were, and humanity used these allo-technologies. Now, in the 'informational era', we know that matter contains information, with an inherent potential. Thus, there is potential to switch to 'homeo-technologies', based on cooperation with nature. However, it is clear that the techno-scientific mentalities have not changed yet."

I. Immaterial Work

Knowledge is becoming a crucial production factor, but Gorz insists it is not just formal knowledge, but also passion, creativity, expression, engagement, qualities which are 'beyond measure'. Abstract labour is no longer the determinant, though industrial modes are still co-existing along with the newly emergent.

Here are 3 quotes that set the tone about the changes in work culture and management styles:

- “Le travailleur ne se présente plus comme possesseur de sa seule force de travail hetero-produite (ca.d. des capacités inculquées par l’employeur, mais comme s'étant produit et continuant à se produire lui-même." (Yann-Moulier Boutang, cited by Gorz, p. 18)

- “Ce ne sont pas les individus qui, intériorisant la ‘culture d'entreprise', c’est plutôt l’entreprise qui va désormais chercher à l'extérieur, c.a.d. au niveau de la vie quotidienne de chacun, les compétences et les capacités dont elle a besoin.” (M. Combes & B. Aspe, Alice #1, 1988, cited by Gorz, p. 19)

- “En devenant la base d’une production fondée sur l’innovation, la communication et l’improvisation continuelles, le travail immatériel tend finanlement a se confondre avec un travail de production.” (Gorz, p. 20)

Work has become the management of a flux of information and productivity is therefore no longer measured in time spent but in overall coordination and the capacity of the nodes to communicate. Fordist workers were requested to loose their previous knowledge; postfordist workers are hired for their general intellect and capacity for expressive/cooperative work. Required then were 'objective' 'machines', while today full subjectivities are demanded.

The new postfordist workers produce themselves through subjectivation of the collective inheritance of common culture.

The detailed and hierarchical division of labour is virtually abolished in networked work, and the means of production become collective through the use of the computer as a universal tool. Nevertheless, because self-production is subsumed to capital, but not totally, the worker retains a private sphere. Thus to obtain total mastery of such workers, this sphere has to abolished: everyone has to become self-entrepreneur, responsible for their own human capital and its continuous renewal. Hence capital wants to abolish the salary, and replace it with marketable services where individuals compete against one another.

-All your life has to be managed as a business. For example, workfare falls under this logic: the unemployed period is seen as a period where the job is to search for a job, and/or acquire better competences. The universal wage is an answer to the precariousness of the situation, if it can create a sphere that is separate from exchange value, but it can also exist in a neoliberal context where it justifies productivism.

II. Immaterial capital

Knowledge, and not abstract labour, is now the main determinant of value. But the characteristics of knowledge are 'beyond measure'!

Thus, knowledge work, and its products, are equally heterogenous and beyond measure. This creates a crisis in exchange value. Nevertheless, capital will try to incorporate it in its system.

Gorz distinguishes

   - 'savoir', i.e. unconsciously learned practical knowledge, taken from the commons (language, sports, body practices), from
   - 'connaissance', formalized knowledge which has been increasingly professionalized in the latter 20th cy, which also means an equivalent impoverishment of the common pool of 
knowledge. 

Such a codification / professionalization can never be complete however. This is why good professionals are also still artists, with a transcending 'brand name'.

These qualities, based on self-production in a common culture cannot be considered to be 'fixed' capital. In the history of capital, knowledge was used against the worker, considered as a mere extension of the machine. And later, knowledge production itself was formalized as in the chemical and pharmaceutical industries. Already then, units could be produced at marginal cost, a situation that is now generalized in the immaterial economy. In this case, exchange value can only be maintained through artificial barriers, to diffusion and access, though only on a temporary basis. This is the role of IP legislation! As made clear in the citation below on free software, the immensely intensified productivity destroys value (unit price goes down) and creates an economy of abundance, that tends to gratuity (the example of the phone), and thus increasingly fails to create income. Hence Gorz concludes that the crisis of cognitive capitalism is a crisis of capitalism itself.

The double crisis is defined by the problem of creating income when products need diminishing labour, and how to create exchange value when products tend to be part of the commons. Next Gorz asks: how is the transformation into capital effected, drawing on Rifkin.

French-language quotes on value in free software:

- “La valeur d'échange de la connaissance est donc entièrement liée à la capacité pratique de limiter sa diffusion libre. La valeur découle uniquement des limitations établies, institutionnellement ou de fait, à l'accès à la connaissance.” (Enzo Ruliani, cited by Gorz, p. 45)

- “La vraie nouveauté, c’est que la connaissance, séparée de tout produit, peut exercer par elle-même une action productive sous la forme du logiciel:

   - Elle peut organiser et gérer les interactions complexes entre un grand nombre d’acteurs et de variables
   - Concevoir et conduire des machines et des systèmes de productions

- Le coût marginal des logiciels étant très faibles, elle peut économiser beaucoup plus de travail qu’elle n’en a coûté, et cela dans des  proportions gigantesques. Elle détruit immensément plus de valeur qu’elle n’en crée." (Gorz, p. 47)

Facts about Immateriality

Symbolic content of products is now primary, and this is where profit comes from:

       - 1/3 of machinery is now rented ('use it, don't own it')
       - 80% of infrastructure is rented
       - 1/3 of industry outsources more than 50% of their production
       - material production only counts for 1/3 of the stock exchange value

Firms are no longer re-engineering, but creating a new division of labour, whereby 'material production' is completely outsourced. This production is carried out as cheaply as possible, while profits come from the sale of branded products at higher prices. Gorz argues that brands like Nike function like feudal lords, forcing their partner companies to intensity exploitation, by continually renewing their contracts.