Debating the Post-Capitalist Future: From the Rise of the Immaterial Economy to Competition for Attention

The article critically evaluates theories and concepts related to the decline of capitalism and emergence of post-capitalist social relations. The prevalent assumption that capitalism is experiencing a deep crisis raises the question concerning what kind of socioeconomic system might replace it. For this reason, it becomes necessary to critique the various attempts of theorists to keep capitalism alive by ascribing new “modifications” (late, too late, techno, hyper, glam, digital, communicative, “cool”, surveillance, platform, etc.) to it. The rise of the immaterial economy implies a radical transformation of production relations structured according to the principles of accumulation and appropriation. As creativity, which cannot be mechanically controlled or accounted for, comes to replace labour, individual and exceptional goods take over from mass production; meanwhile, private ownership of material goods is challenged by the social nature of knowledge, artistic values, and new engineering ideas. At the same time, social theory appears to be increasingly acknowledging the futility of idealising the new economy or considering it as “ripening fruits” of a communist future. In joining the debate on this issue, the author notes a number of fundamental obstacles that call the prospect of a non-antagonistic society into question. In the first place, this concerns the limitation of two centrally important non-material economy resources: attention and individual personality. The growing roles played by creativity and attention in the non-material economy entail an increasingly intense competitive struggle for influence and self-realisation. At the same time, there are no obvious means by which to eradicate asymmetrical power relations and individualism, which have deeper historical roots than capitalism. As in earlier times, there is no single locus for the concentration of power, exploitation and appropriation. Here we refer not so much to Internet platforms or mass media as individual people, who increasingly become super-rich and super-influential thanks to their nontrivial personal qualities, prodigious

Keywords: capitalism; postcapitalism; platform capitalism; communism; socialism; creative economy; attention economy; Marxism; postmarxism; neofeudalism; class struggle; class antagonism; socioeconomic inequality