The perils of historical analogies: Labour in transition

Abstract

This commentary on Arvidsson and Bonini's ‘Factories or workhouses? Digital Platforms and the re-feudalisation thesis’ engages with its contribution to subjectivity, reproduction and re-feudalisation, while cautioning its use of an historical analogy between workhouses and platforms. We argue that the significance of workhouses for the transition to capitalism should be more carefully considered, notably by addressing (1) the differentiated development of capitalism in various geopolitical contexts and (2) how the state and its class relations managed the impact of workhouses on individuals. This historical specificity complicates the analogy with platforms and forces us to reject more deterministic and teleological approaches to the transition and to broader patterns of social change. To unveil whether digital platforms prepare the surplus population resulting from the crisis of neo-liberal capitalism for a transition from capitalism requires further unpacking the broader class and social relations this new institution reflects.