AUGUST 13 — Alienation. One word that summarises our collective frustration towards how society works and how we react to our changing environment. Sure, we’re now  more connected to remote parts of the world due to the advent of transportation and communications, but being connected is not the same as being less alien. 

This notion of alienation isn’t so much about being detached from society as it is being estranged from the self, or as philosophers would like to say, the state of nature. 

It is one that has been discussed by both Marx (albeit more subtly) and Rousseau; both theorists talked about how alienation brought about ruin to mankind. For Marx it was mankind’s alienation from his labour, while for Rousseau it is man’s alienation from his state of nature, one defined by Rousseau to be of primitive independence.

While these theories are very much conditioned by their respective historical contexts, they are unflinchingly modernist visions that serve as powerful indictments of our society.

Marx’s theory of alienation of labour led him to conclude that the capitalist economy was an exploitative one that only contributed to the growth of the bourgeoisie, and to the poverty of the workers. 

Does this not echo the oft-quoted phrase, “The rich gets richer, while the poor gets poorer”? Or the fact that the growth of the Chinese economy does not correlate with the growth and the living standards of its rural population? 

Marx sees labour as the essence of humanity, as intrinsic to the human soul. To him, alienation from our labour makes us less human. Marx’s solution was in the form of a socialist programme outlined in the Communist Manifesto, one which was well-intentioned to liberate man from long work hours and oppressive work conditions so as to allow man to be able to develop his labour. 

Marx promotes this overtly in his German Ideology where he writes that, “In communist society... each can become accomplished in any branch he wishes, society regulates the general production and thus makes it possible for me to do one thing today and another tomorrow, to hunt in the morning, fish in the afternoon, rear cattle in the evening, criticize after dinner, just as I have a mind, without ever becoming hunter, fisherman, shepherd or critic.” Marx’s idealism is in short a conviction that our capitalist economy separates the individual self and his soul because of its mode of production. 

We think that capitalism makes us happy because it gives us choices. On the surface, there are plenty of benefits. But in a capitalist society, the worker who produces goods is not producing for himself directly, but for his capitalist owner. Marx sees this as an alienation from labour that prevents us from developing our own creative labour and talents. 

Today, this is undoubtedly true for factory workers and sweatshop labourers in Third World countries. It is also true for those of us engaged full-time in desk-jobs, because we’re still limited in our ability to develop non-work related labours.   Even if we’d like to dismiss Marx’s idealism as impossible and criticise it for its impracticality, there is an ounce of truth in it, one that is manifest in our subconscious desire to de-alienate ourselves from our labour. Why else do people say, “Do something you like, instead of something that pays”? 

Rousseau’s theory of alienation is far, far more extreme. His is a complete repudiation of everything society stands for, from the way society is to the way it has developed. But it’s one that is not at all irrelevant to our technology-dependent, social-media-consumed society. He sees man as alienated from his true self that is his independent, primitive nature due to society and the advancement of the arts and sciences. He claims that, “Nature made man happy and good, but society depraves him and makes him miserable.” 

What is it about society, then? Appearances divorced from reality. Excessive and artificial dependence on the opinions of others. Social expectations that resemble nothing our heart desires. Pursuit of knowledge not for its own sake, but to be above others. It is as if Rousseau was living in our midst. He perceives that this corruption of society has hollowed the essence of mankind’s self. He saw that modern man is governed by artificial needs which can be satisfied only with the help of other people. 

This notion of alienation isn’t so much about being detached from society as it is being estranged from the self, or as philosophers would like to say, the state of nature. – Picture by Choo Choy May

Rousseau identifies this dependence as a cause for man’s misery and misguided efforts to find contentment. He sees the loss of personal reality and individuality to be detrimental influences on human psychology which has resulted in man’s acute inner conflict. Man is thus “always a stranger to himself and ill at ease when he is compelled to withdraw into himself.” 

Rousseau’s claims are not at all foreign to our contemporary world. As we obsess over appearances, prestige, social standing, societal approval and affirmation in the form of things as miserably pitiful as the number of likes on Facebook and as narrowly subjective as accreditation by select governing bodies, we sometimes forget that these are social constructs and instead internalise them as individual standards. We forget that “want” is not “need.” We become selves that are not souls in essence, but selves that are put together by the artifice of society. We chase things that don’t fulfil ourselves apart from the flaky image we try to project. 

We try, but fail to be content because we’re trying the wrong things at the wrong places. 

* This is the personal opinion of the columnist.