Ma Xinying: Critiques of Capitalist Modernization by Foreign Marxists
Modernization in the 21st century exhibits periodic characteristics of rapid transition, accelerated development, profound reform, and deep adjustment. Bolstered by a new technological revolution represented by computing, big data, and artificial intelligence, capitalist modernization has undergone new changes; its productive forces and science and technology have expanded to an unprecedented degree. However, due to the inherent contradictions of capitalism and the problems exposed by the process of global capital accumulation, capitalist modernization remains a "troublemaker" in the global process of modernization, even in the digital age. Standing upon these new era characteristics, foreign Marxists have combined the critical stance of Marxism with new theoretical resources to launch a new critique of capitalist modernization.
I. New Trends in the Critique of Capitalist Modernization
The critique of modernization is a reflection and critique directed at the contradictions, ruptures, deviations, negative consequences, and loss of meaning that emerge during the modernization process. Its goal is to pull a deviating modernization back onto the developmental track of human civilization. Marx once described the negative consequences of capitalist modernization in the Manifesto of the Communist Party: "Society suddenly finds itself put back into a state of momentary barbarism; it appears as if a famine, a universal war of devastation, had cut off the supply of every means of subsistence; industry and commerce seem to be destroyed... The productive forces at the disposal of society no longer tend to further the development of the conditions of bourgeois property." The thoroughness of Marx’s critique of modernization lies in the fact that, although he viewed the birth of capitalism as the beginning of modern society, he never believed that capitalist modernization was the end point of modernization's development. The barbarity, exploitativeness, predatoriness, profit-seeking, and inequality inherent in the capitalist mode of production and relations of production dictate that capitalist modernization is merely a specific model of modernization; it will eventually be replaced by a higher form of civilization—a modernization that better meets the requirements for the free and comprehensive development of human beings.
Foreign Marxists in the 20th century inherited Marx's critical stance, conducting deep critiques of capitalist modernization from various perspectives such as the reconstruction of modernity, the drawbacks of industrialization, the trends of globalization, the alienation of modern society, and the crisis of the ecological environment. In their critiques, the mask of the "civilization model" was stripped from capitalist modernization, leaving its flaws fully exposed, its developmental dilemmas increasingly clear, and its negative effects increasingly obvious. Entering the 21st century, "the contradiction between the content and form of the modernization and globalization process led by Western society and capital has continued to develop, reflecting the objective requirement for new forms to replace the old." The 2008 international financial crisis was not only a manifestation of the continued deterioration of the fundamental contradictions of capitalism, but it further demonstrated that capitalist modernization has not escaped its developmental predicament; instead, it has dragged the entire world into a new crisis. In response, foreign Marxists have seized upon the new contradictions and problems of capitalist modernization to conduct new analyses and critiques.
(1) Critique of Digital Capitalism
In the 21st century, digital technologies represented by computing, big data, and artificial intelligence have reshaped the time and space of human society, altered methods of production, life, and social interaction, and pushed modernization into the digital age. However, "the combination of ubiquitous computer networks with existing capitalism has greatly broadened the effective scope of the market." Addressing this fusion of digital technology and capitalism, Dan Schiller first proposed the term "digital capitalism" in 1990, noting that computer networks and capitalist market principles represent a mutual conquest. On one hand, computer networks make "market deepening" [1] possible, continuously expanding the scope of the capitalist economy; on the other hand, capitalist market principles have conquered and controlled cyberspace, turning it into a core tool for production and control within a highly transnational market system. Subsequent foreign Marxists have also critiqued digital capitalism as an economic form under capitalist production conditions.
In terms of content, the critique of digital capitalism mainly targets the exploitative nature of digital labor and the monopolistic nature of digital platforms. Beyond the direct exploitation of digital labor related to the production of information and communication technologies, the unpaid labor of internet users is also an object of exploitation. Moreover, this exploitation is hidden within the "play" of social media; entertainment and labor time are intertwined, causing humans to blur the boundary between work and leisure, such that all time is subsumed into the capitalist mechanism of exploitation. On the other hand, once data is organized by algorithms, it becomes a reusable database, granting monopoly advantages to the platforms that aggregate this data. Platforms not only obtain data from a multitude of users but also control and establish the rules for data usage. The laborers who produce the data have no discourse power over the data materials they create. Meanwhile, platforms use various rules to claim ownership of the data, and then rely on data analysis to extract monopoly returns through various channels.
(2) Critique of Biopolitics
As modern society's control over human life becomes increasingly pervasive, the "critique of biopolitics" pioneered by Foucault has become a new perspective for critiquing modernization. "Biopower" was the concept Foucault used to describe capital's manipulation of the human body, but Hardt and Negri argue that biopower is a new paradigm of power whose fundamental task is to function as a normative force within society. Biopower has penetrated deeply into people’s consciousness, minds, intellects, and emotions; "power has manifested as a form of control that extends to the deepest reaches of the consciousness and bodies of the population, while simultaneously spanning the entirety of social relations," achieving capital's comprehensive control over human life.
Agamben proposed a "new biopolitics" from the perspective of state sovereignty. Life is divided into "natural life" in the biological sense and "political life" at the political level; once political life is stripped away by the "sovereign," the individual is left only with unprotected "bare life" [2], whom anyone can kill with impunity. Within the sovereign state, the sovereign carves out a "state of exception" outside the community, allowing life to become bare life at any moment, thereby manifesting the control of power over life. Esposito, however, argues that life under a community is not merely suppressed or deprived, but also immunized and protected. The community builds an "immune body" that enjoys protection over individual life. For society, the immunization mechanism not only expands the space of the community but also restores the positive side of biopolitics.
(3) Critique of the Modern State
Capitalist states in the 21st century have undergone three major changes: the impact and challenges of globalization on the state have become greater; state governance has become the primary political means; and the capitalist world has built more powerful state institutions. Accordingly, foreign Marxists have launched a "critique of new imperialism." They argue that the United States is a capitalist empire in the true sense. The U.S. implements a new mode of imperial rule, exercising dominance over other countries through the use of economic trade, foreign aid, international patronage, and covert coercive measures. The U.S. can interfere in the economic development of dependent states either through unilateral action or via transnational institutions like the International Monetary Fund (IMF)—an effect no less significant than direct colonial rule, and without the high costs of physical occupation. Since the financial crisis, while U.S. economic hegemony is no longer unchallenged, U.S. military hegemony, as the essential manifestation of imperialism, has been further strengthened.
As the relationship between globalization and the nation-state has become a focal point, state critique theory has enjoyed a revival, represented by figures such as Bob Jessop. He proposed that the state must be analyzed within a "strategic-relational" context. Under globalization, when capitalist accumulation strategies change, the form of the state and state decision-making change accordingly. Furthermore, the behavior of nation-states is being reshaped; "governance" is becoming the primary task and a new functional point for the nation-state. However, state governance is not a permanent solution; governance still generates serious conflicts and creates new contradictions. This is because these governance means are merely state strategies for the globalization phase; various crises remain latent within the future capitalist state.
(4) Critique of the Ecological Crisis
Because developed countries have transferred ecological contradictions to other nations and used globalization issues to mask the ecological crisis, and because the living environments in developed countries have improved, the ecological protection movement has tended toward conservatism. Consequently, eco-Marxism no longer shows the strong development it once did in the 21st century, but its critique continues nonetheless.
Ecological justice is a critical theme formed on the basis of political science and ethics. Ecological justice in the 21st century has moved from the pursuit of "biological justice" (equality between humans and nature) toward "social justice." "Social justice—or the increasing lack thereof on a global scale—is the most pressing of all environmental problems." Social justice identifies capitalism as the root cause of the ecological crisis from the perspective of social development. Additionally, ecological justice has shifted from distributive justice to productive justice, emphasizing that justice is reflected not only in the quantitative distribution of wages, wealth, and income, but even more so in the production processes of labor, technology, the division of labor, and land use.
Regarding ecological revolution, there are two main positions: one advocates for "incremental" social change, tending to view the ecological problems brought by capitalist development from an "objective" perspective; the other links ecological issues with socialism, advocating for a radical ecological revolution. Eco-socialism emphasizes the need to reconstruct society; this reconstruction must transform the relationship between humanity and nature through the "metabolism" [3] of the entire society. These two different positions give eco-Marxism a character where conservatism and radicalism coexist.
(5) Spatial Critique
Spatial critique uses space and the "production of space" as a fundamental dimension for critiquing modernization. Urban and global spaces are the primary sites of struggle for spatial justice. In cities, due to speculation by capitalists, land prices rise and space becomes a symbol of wealth. The amount of an individual's wealth is expressed by the amount of space they occupy. Urbanization is both a means for capitalists to accumulate wealth and a process by which the wealth of laborers is plundered. In the globalization of capital, capital has formed a spatial production pattern of "center-periphery" countries. Center countries exploit and oppress periphery countries economically and dominate/control them politically; capital is transferred to periphery countries through globalization, and then high profits are continuously extracted from them, forming inequality between nations.
Spatial resistance aims to achieve spatial justice by resisting the "spatialization" of capital and unequal spatial relations. Edward Soja proposed "Thirdspace" as a new space for resisting capitalist dominance. In this space, "all history-geography, all times and places, are ubiquitously presented and represented, becoming a strategic space of force and dominance, oppression and resistance." Soja also proposed the "right to the city" to ensure urban residents' right to participate in the production of space and to guarantee their equal status within that space.
Furthermore, cyberspace possesses greater liquidity and convenience, making it easier for capital to circulate and turnover rapidly, and thus easier to become a target of capital control. Therefore, the critique of cyberspace mainly includes the relationship between cyberspace and physical space, the relationship between cyberspace and capitalist spatial production, and whether cyberspace possesses a liberating significance for resisting capitalist control.
(6) Critique of Modern Society
The critique of modern society in the 21st century still adheres to the method of "social diagnosis"—that is, uncovering the characteristics of modern society and then conducting a critical analysis of those characteristics. Guided by this method, Rahel Jaeggi resolved to rediscover the critical power of "alienation." She points out that alienation is a kind of disruption in the relationship between the self and the world; "an alienated world is a meaningless world, one that we do not experience as a meaningful whole." In alienation, humans are estranged from the world. Humans lose both power and meaning; they can neither touch nor change the world, nor can they obtain from the world the basis for their emotions or existence. Hartmut Rosa also explains alienation as a relationship between the self and the world. "Alienation indicates a deep, structural distortion of the relationship between the self and the world—that is, a distortion of the way the subject is 'placed' or 'situated' within the world." Alienation means the failure of human adaptation activities; it means the subject is drifting outside of the world.
Hartmut Rosa argues that modern society is governed, regulated, and dominated by a non-political, rigorous temporal regime. This temporal regime is the "logic of social acceleration." Under this logic, society experiences acceleration in science and technology, social change, and the pace of life, with the three forming a closed-loop system. Technological acceleration increases the speed of production and daily life, while accelerated social change causes the pace of life to accelerate; in modern society, social acceleration has become a self-propelling system that requires no external driving force. In an accelerated society, time flies by but no longer leaves a trace in human memory; the human experience of life becomes increasingly impoverished, ultimately leading to severe self-alienation.
II. New Trends in the Critique of Capitalist Modernization
If modernization is viewed as a historical process of global transformation with specific connotations, then compared to the 20th-century critique of capitalist modernization, the critique offered by foreign Marxists in the 21st century has exhibited three major trends:
(1) A shift from diachronic critique to synchronic critique
“Synchronic” and “diachronic” were originally concepts used by the linguist Ferdinand de Saussure to denote states of language and stages of evolution. As research methods, the two differ. Synchronic research emphasizes the logical and psychological relations that connect coexisting terms forming a system, as perceived by the same collective consciousness. Diachronic research, by contrast, emphasizes relations between successive terms that are “not perceived by one and the same collective consciousness, and which succeed each other without forming a system.” Synchrony knows only a single state, and its methods consist of collecting facts; diachronic linguistics, however, can trace development downward or upward through time.
If we use this methodology to look at the critique of modernization, the 20th-century critique of capitalist modernization exhibits distinct “diachronic” characteristics. Marx pointed out in The German Ideology: “History is nothing but the succession of the separate generations... The more the separate spheres, which interact on one another, expand in the course of this development... the more history becomes world history.” Grounded in the Marxist world-historical outlook, 20th-century foreign Marxists situated modernization within the process of historical development. This was akin to a longitudinal connection: starting from the feudal and pre-modern, they explored the formation and development of capitalist modernization, reflected on its characteristics and manifestations, and criticized its negative effects and defects.
In contrast, the 21st-century critique of capitalist modernization manifests “synchronic” characteristics. Since entering the 21st century, modernization has become a vast “context” (or state), in which various critical themes, angles, discourses, and concepts reflect new features of modernization. The 21st-century critique of capitalist modernization is like taking a cross-section of modernization; critics no longer obsess over the origins and development of modernization or confine themselves to historical tracing. What they seek is the concentrated manifestation of modernization and its internal relations. Modernization in the 21st century possesses a powerful reality. For the critique of capitalist modernization, importance is placed on its current existence, manifestations, and characteristics, and on the impact of this modernization on the existential state of contemporary people. Tracing the origins of capitalist modernization remains important, but it is no longer the gravity center of 21st-century critique, because it is evident that this point is no longer so vital for people living in contemporary society.
(2) A shift from the critique of modernity to the critique of modernization itself
Foreign Marxists in the 20th century were more concerned with the core concept of modernization—modernity. As Habermas noted, “Since the late 18th century, modernity has been a theme of ‘philosophical’ discussion.” In Habermas’s view, the concept of modernity required self-understanding through the lens of Western rationality; thus, definitions of modernity began with Hegel, while Marx, Weber, Lukács, and the Frankfurt School continually elaborated on it through the methods of social theory. Through the efforts of these thinkers, the self-understanding of modernity was expressed not only as a theoretical “self-consciousness” and a self-critical stance against all tradition, but also as moral and ethical concepts of “self-determination” and “self-realization.” Furthermore, the self-critique of modernity triggered an analysis of the crisis of modernity. Questioning the fate of modernity within capitalist society became a critical hotspot. The critique and reflection on modernity became an effective tool for analyzing the rational essence of capitalist society and a theme that ran through the entire 20th-century critique of capitalist modernization.
Unlike the 20th century, the 21st-century critique of capitalist modernization no longer focuses on the rationality of modernity. This is because, through the deconstruction of postmodern discourse, the authority of the metaphysical-rational concepts of the past has vanished. By emphasizing fragments, ruptures, and marginalization—as well as difference, non-identity, and particularity—the critical themes of modern society have been renewed. On a global scale, most countries and regions in the 21st century have been integrated into the modernization process, gradually moving toward a more mature modern society. Modern industrial civilization, along with its defects, has been accepted by people; whether it be crisis or alienation, these have become established facts of modern society. The 21st-century critique of capitalist modernization no longer judges the suffering or alienation endured by people based on external grounds; instead, it emphasizes judging the degree of negativity in capitalist modernization based on the feelings, beliefs, and actions of the social subjects themselves. Consequently, focusing on the “present” of capitalist modernization—its own structures, developmental paths, power controls, new manifestations of contradiction, and the consequences of its global expansion—has become the primary content of 21st-century critique.
(3) A shift from socio-cultural critique to political critique
As early as the beginning of the 20th century, a group of foreign Marxists took it as their mission to reveal the oppression of human nature and society by capitalist modernization, proposing critical theories with far-reaching influence. Critical theory explored why, under the Enlightenment of capitalism, humanity did not enter a truly human state but instead fell deep into barbarism. “With the development of the bourgeois commodity economy, the dark horizon of myth was illuminated by the sun of calculating reason, and behind this cold light, the seeds of a new barbarism are taking root and bearing fruit.” While creating modern civilization, capitalist modernization also brought barbarism and the repression of human nature. Critical theory inherited the Marxist critical tradition and recognized that the capitalist system led to social irrationality. This gave rise to many concepts such as the critique of instrumental reason, the critique of the culture industry, the critique of capitalist ideology, and the critique of the one-dimensional society. However, as Horkheimer and Adorno noted, critical theory remained confined within traditional disciplines, primarily conducting research within the domains of sociology, psychology, and epistemology. Thus, critical theory appeared more often in the guise of socio-cultural or ideological critique.
The 21st-century critique of capitalist modernization has shifted more toward political critique. This signifies a change in the emphasis and the field of critique. In 20th-century critiques, while political critique existed, it was only one perspective among many and did not receive sufficient attention. Entering the 21st century, political critique has gradually become the core of the critique of capitalist modernization. From the critique of new imperialism and neoliberalism under capitalist globalization to the critique of spatial politics, biopolitics, and national governance—even including the critique of digital capitalism and ecological justice—all possess distinct characteristics of political critique. Hegemony, power control, equality, justice, and biopower have become the conceptual sources that stimulate a more radical critique of capitalist modernization. It is worth mentioning that after the 2008 international financial crisis signaled the failure of neoliberalism, the theoretical threads of Marxist political critique were reactivated. In the context of the increasing instability of the contemporary world political system, foreign Marxists have also integrated Marxist methods of political critique to redefine the capitalist state.
III. New Significance of the Critique of Capitalist Modernization
In addition to continuing their critique of capitalist modernization, 21st-century foreign Marxists are no longer confined to the distinction between “tradition and modernity,” nor do they view capitalist modernization as a “singular modernization.” Instead, they boldly explore the historical stage in which capitalist modernization resides and conduct new inquiries into the future of modernization and the possibilities for human civilization.
(1) Revealing new contradictions facing contemporary capitalism
As the “two sides of the same coin” of contemporary capitalism, neoliberalism and new imperialism together form the state and social formations of the contemporary capitalist world. They jointly resolve the contradictions of capitalist accumulation, striving desperately to create conditions for the profitable absorption of surplus value, even to the point of using hegemony to tear down any possible barriers. Driven by neoliberalism and new imperialism, financial monopoly capital has achieved a high degree of globalization and internationalization, forming international financial monopoly capitalism. Correspondingly, contemporary capitalism has entered the stage of international financial monopoly capitalism, characterized by the globalization of monopolies, the formation of alliances among transnational corporations, and the absolutization of financial monopoly capital.
The critique of neoliberalism and new imperialism by foreign Marxists is not only an inherent part of the modernization critique but also represents their deep analysis and profound insight into contemporary capitalism. Through their critique, the basic contradictions of contemporary capitalism have taken on new forms: the contradiction between the infinite expansion of capitalist productive capacity enhanced by new technologies and the insufficiency of global effective demand; the contradiction between financial speculation and plunder by international financial monopoly capitalism and the financial sovereignty of developing countries; the contradiction between the mitigation of ecological contradictions in developed countries and the deterioration of the global ecological environment; the contradiction between the expansion of capital into cyberspace and digital fields and the globalization of the network and data; and the contradiction between the accelerated development of science, technology, and society and the state of existential anxiety and alienation into which modern people have fallen. To varying degrees, these contradictions have intensified the basic contradictions of capitalism and exacerbated the trends of surplus monopoly capital and financial crises.
(2) Enriching the new understanding of the developmental stages of modernization
Through the 21st-century critique of capitalist modernization, people can clearly perceive that human society has entered a high-tech era of accelerated development, while simultaneously entering a high-risk era fraught with crises and frequent dangers. The hallmark of 21st-century society is “global integration.” At this stage, modernization has not only achieved globalization in production processes, trade cooperation, capital flows, and cultural exchanges but has also realized the globalization of network connectivity, information interaction, and talent exchange. However, the capitalist form of private appropriation is becoming increasingly incompatible with this broad trend of world-level and global “integration.” Capitalist unipolarity, economic hegemony, political power-play, military threats, and cultural invasion—no matter which aspect is considered—run contrary to the main trend of world development. The contradiction between “globalization” and “capitalization” in the 21st century is not merely a contradiction between “form and content,” but rather an indication that capitalist modernization is by no means the bright path toward human civilization. The new trend of world development will inevitably call for higher and better modernizing content to adapt to it. The path and model of modernization are not limited to the single road of capitalist modernization; rather, there is a plurality and diversity of path options.
From another perspective, the critique of capitalist modernization by foreign Marxists remains a warning against the negative consequences of modernization’s development. Although capitalist modernization promoted a great development of productive forces, this development came at the cost of exploiting and plundering other countries, oppressing and squeezing the working people, destroying and extracting natural resources, and intensifying and aggravating the global wealth gap. In fact, in the 20th-century critique of capitalist modernization, people already saw the price the world paid to achieve capitalist modernization; it was just that at that time, the world could still bear it. However, the 21st-century Earth—whether in terms of the natural environment, population distribution, or living conditions—is already extremely fragile and can no longer withstand the bottomless development model of capitalist modernization. The world-wide economic crises, severe natural disasters, sudden global diseases, and destructive climate catastrophes that have erupted over these twenty-plus years of the 21st century are all clear evidence that human modernization has reached a stage where its development must be profoundly reflected upon.
(3) Embodying new expectations for the future society
Compared to the critiques of capitalist modernization in the 20th century, 21st-century non-Chinese Marxist thinkers have not allowed a pervasive sense of pessimism to take hold while conducting their critiques; on the contrary, they have put forward greater expectations for the development of future society. This is because, within the practice of human modernization in the 21st century, these Marxists have found a new point of reference—the developmental path and model of socialist modernization. John B. Foster, a representative figure of ecological Marxism, points out that humanity can entirely choose another alternative: the construction of a 21st-century eco-socialism that is truly equal, ecologically sustainable, and capable of satisfying the needs of the masses. David Kotz also notes that if neoliberalism continues to wreak havoc on the world, the socialist movement will once again radiate vitality to abolish capitalism and establish a social system predicated on human needs rather than private profit. Many scholars have even gone so far as to imagine the bright prospects of digital socialism: "Public ownership, computerized high technology, a post-scarcity society that creates wealth for all, the full development of individuality, distribution according to need, participatory management, a shared culture, and a spirit of internationalism are all characteristics of a socialist society."
There are specific reasons why non-Chinese Marxists no longer harbor a universal pessimism toward modernization and why they seek a better prospect for modernization alongside their critiques. From the perspective of human civilization, modernization is the mode through which human civilization is realized. Different paths to achieving modernization determine the different states in which civilization manifests. Capitalist modernization has reinforced the negative aspects of modern civilization, causing it to produce catastrophic consequences characterized by the supremacy of capital, the supremacy of money, the bullying of the weak by the strong, and the destruction of nature. Conversely, the socialist modernization represented by Chinese-path modernization guides the progressive nature of modern civilization. Its manifestations—the primacy of the people, solidarity and cooperation, peaceful development, and green development—will greatly stimulate the positive potential of modern civilization. By following such a path, world modernization will ultimately break through its predicament and reveal a new vista of development.