The Idea of Alienation in Economic Theory - Coursework Example

? To What Extent Can Blauner’s Operationalization of Alienation Be Regarded As Marxist? Outline Introduction Body Conclusion Introduction Alienation,a term which was first conceptualised by Karl Marx in Economic and Philosophical Manuscripts of 1844 and which literally meant estrangement, was attributed to labour under the capitalist system. He regarded that it was a product of capitalist production since individuals had happened to be estranged from the set of people, things and events that these individuals were usually accustomed with, however, as an effect of the system in the modern society, their relations to others would be not as deep as the normal. For him, this feeling of estrangement was because commodities which have value would control and shape the activities of human beings or a belief which was also known as commodity fetishism (Craib: 1997: 35 – 42; Haralambos, 2004: 621 – 623; Slattery, 2003: 14 – 21). On the one hand, for Blauner, alienation was job dissatisfaction. In 1940s, Robert Blauner had examined alienation through the manual workers in the American modern industry (Grint: 1998: 269 – 272). In his effort to link Melvin Seeman’s psychological dimensions of alienation, his operationalization of the concept alienation was very much resembling to that of Marx’s idea of alienation under the capitalist system even though he was not a Marxist. Because of this, Blauner was criticised for using a non – Marxist concept of alienation. In this regard, this paper would aim at figuring out up to what extent is Blauner’s operationalization of alienation regarded as Marxist. Main Body Marx’s idea of alienation under capitalism was comprised by four (4) characteristics. First, he identified that alienation could result from the worker’s alienation from the product of his own labour. It was the case that in capitalism, the worker who produced the product had no longer control over that certain product. The control was owned by the capitalist system which had not only controlled his workers but also had the control over the product of labour of his workers. Second, a worker could be alienated from the very act of production itself for the reason that this very act of production was something in exchange of profit through wages instead of his social needs. Third, a worker could be alienated from his very own self being the producer of the product, as a human being. He, then, happened to see himself doing meaningless activities because he was reduced to a machine working for survival. Forth, a worker could be alienated from the other workers. In a capitalist society, social relations happened to be displaced for labour was something that was reduced to a commodity needed to be exchanged in the market (Craib: 1997: 35 – 42; Slattery, 2003: 14 – 21). On the one hand, alienation for Blauner was something that was not a result of the capitalist relations but was something that was attributed to job dissatisfaction. For him, this concept comprised four (4) dimensions such as powerlessness, meaninglessness, isolation and self – estrangement. The first sign of alienation, powerlessness, was the degree of control the worker had over his work in which the control was shaped by external factors. Second was meaninglessness or the sense of purpose that the worker had in his job. Third indication was social isolation which was characterised by the extent to which they were integrated at the social level with their co – workers. The last state was self – estrangement which was regarded as how involved a worker was in his work (Fulcher and Scott, 2007: 679 – 682). Moreover, according to Haralambos (2004: 626 – 629) and O’Donnell (1997: 262 – 268), Blauner considered 4 occupational situations through printing industry (craft technology), textile industry (machine minding technology), car industry (assembly line production), and chemical industry (automation) in his examination of alienation. As an illustration of a pre – industrial craft technology, the printing industry was used. In this case, he considered that the printers were free workers inside the said industry since he figured out through his study that only a little 4 percent had regarded their jobs to be uninteresting. These workers were not feeling powerless about their jobs. In this case, he objectively perceived their work as not alienating. Meanwhile, he used textile industry to illustrate the early onset of the industrialized era. It was the case that the textile workers had felt no freedom, being tied in the machines, in their traditional community, hence, they were alienated in the kind of job they had. The extent of powerlessness was high among them. Thus, their dissatisfaction in this kind of job or alienation was also considered to be very high. Nonetheless, the most alienating work was in the car industry because worker’s pace of work was influenced by the machines. They were of course powerless and isolated from the other workers. His last industry sample was a sample of automated continuous process through the chemical industry. In this illustration, he suggested that there was lower level of alienation in work of this sort because the workers had gained control over the technological advancement in automation. The chemical workers had gained their responsibility and independence and did not suffer being isolated from the other co – workers. Among the others, they were the ones not interested in joining unions against their employers. Higher level of job satisfaction was observed among the workers in the chemical industry. For Blauner, jobs could be more satisfying or less alienating if there would be rotations in jobs and increase in the responsibilities of the workers. After situating Marx and Blauner’s conceptualisation of alienation, basically, what made Blauner’s alienation very close to Marx’s was his 4 dimensions of alienation. First, powerlessness which was defined by Blauner as the extent of which the workers had control over their work was with resemblance to Marx’s idea of alienation in terms of product. For Marx, workers had no control over the products they produced since it was the capitalist system which had control over their products of labour. Next, Blauner’s meaninglessness was similar to Marx’s species. In Blauner’s term, it was the extent of meaning and feeling of purpose that the workers had in their jobs while for Marx’s term, with the advent of machines, workers had become alienated from his own species being. His value was comprised with his capacity to think of the outcomes of his actions as purposeful ideas but because of capitalism, workers had become distanced from their human essence. Isolation of Blauner, or the extent of social integration, on the one hand, was comparable to Marx’s alienation of the worker at the social level, co – workers. Lastly, self – estrangement or the degree of involvement in their work was something close to Marx’s alienation of the worker from their manner of working or producing a product. Blauner’s operationalization of alienation could be regarded as Marxist in these dimensions. However, it was important to note that Marx was basically referring to the class relations in capitalism while Blauner was referring to the nature of occupation as well as the type of technology. Also, it was the case that Blauner simply regarded alienation as a job satisfaction while for Marx, whether a worker was happy or not in his job, it was still a form of alienation. For Marx, this kind of job satisfaction under a capitalist society for people was because of false consciousness. They happened to be so alienated that they were not able to realize their real existing condition (Haralambos: 2004: 621 – 629). Furthermore, Blauner was criticised on his works (Haralambos, 2004; Giddens, 2009). He, being a non – Marxist, was criticised by the Marxists for he had regarded alienation as a subjective matter. For the point of view of the Marxists, it is an objective situation in the capitalist system. It was the case that alienation was present even if the exploited worker did not consider himself to be alienated. That was because of his false consciousness. All the evaluated industries by Blauner had just the same alienation on those. On the one hand, the methodological framework of Blauner had its shortcomings. Since his study on alienation was something based from questionnaires from another study, it could be the case that workers had happened to be unwilling to articulate how dissatisfied they were in their jobs. Aside from that, it could also be the case that the data he analysed was something of difficulty in interpreting. Generalisation from the set of data was a problem especially that he was not able to make observation. As well, he was criticised for regarding technology as the most significant factor for affecting the attitudes and behaviors of his workers even though he had acknowledged that it did not influence work entirely. Nevertheless, it was still the case that his major contribution was that his attempt was able to make the notion of alienation be a variable concept. Conclusion After presenting the information that that would aim to answer the question of up to what extent is Blauner’s operationalization of the concept alienation regarded as Marxist, Blauner’s 4 dimensions of alienation was very similar to that of Marx. Blauner was not a Marxist but his operationalization of alienation was very close to Marx. In this manner, whatever conceptualisation of alienation one accepts, might be that of Marx or Blauner, synthesizing both notions would not be an impossibility. Moreover, even though there were shortcomings to Blauner’s concept, he had still given to the society the fact that alienation could be a variable concept. References: Craib, I. (1997), Classical Social Theory, Oxford: Oxford University Press. Fulcher, J. and Scott, J. (2007), Sociology, Oxford: Oxford University Press. Grint, K (1998), Sociology of Work, 2nd edition, Cambridge: Polity Press. Haralambos, M. (2004), Sociology Themes and Perspectives, 6th edition, London: Harpur Collins. O ‘Donnel, M. (1997), Introduction to Sociology, 4th edition, Nelson Thornes. Slattery, M. (2003), Key Ideas in Sociology, 2nd edition, Nelson Thornes. Read More