General Intellect and the Utopia of Emancipation: A Reconsideration of Contemporary Western Left-Wing Theories of the Subject

Since the 1990s, with the rise of the so-called “knowledge economy,” the role of intellect and knowledge in economic development has become increasingly prominent. How to understand the relationship between intellect and class logic has thus become one of the focal topics of concern for the contemporary Western left. Against this backdrop, left-wing currents represented by autonomism and cognitive capitalism have, based on issues of intellect, immaterial labor, and knowledge production, put forward theories of the “multitude,” the “cognitariat,” and the “cognitive worker” that differ from the traditional proletariat, exerting significant influence in contemporary Western academic circles. This compels us to reconsider the following questions: How did Marx and Engels understand the relationship between intellect and class? Is the distinction between mental and manual labor the dominant logic by which they defined class? What is Engels’s “mental proletariat”? What relationship does the latter have with the “multitude” and the “cognitariat” as described by the Western left? Only after clarifying these questions can we correctly understand and evaluate contemporary Western left-wing theories of the subject.

20世纪90年代以来,随着所谓“知识经济”的兴起,智力和知识在经济发展过程中的作用越来越突出,如何理解智力与阶级逻辑的关系,就成为当代西方左翼关注的焦点话题之一。在此背景下,以自治主义和认知资本主义为代表的左翼思潮基于智力、非物质劳动和知识生产等问题,提出了不同于传统无产阶级的“诸众”(multitude)、“认知无产阶级”(cognitariat)和“认知工人”(cognitive worker)理论,在当代西方学界产生了重要影响。这促使我们不得不重新思考下列几个问题:马克思恩格斯是如何理解智力与阶级的关系的?脑力劳动与体力劳动之分是他们界划阶级的主导逻辑吗?什么是恩格斯所说的“脑力劳动无产阶级”?后者与西方左翼所说的“诸众”和“认识无产阶级”存在何种关系?只有澄清这些问题之后,我们才能正确认识和评价当代西方左翼的主体理论。

I. The Reshaping of Intellect and Class Logic: The Subject Theory of Autonomism and Cognitive Capitalism

一、智力与阶级逻辑的重塑:自治主义和认知资本主义的主体理论

The autonomist school holds that Marx’s theory of the working class and the proletariat is defined on the basis of material labor. In the post-Fordist era, with the rise of the general intellect and immaterial labor, the traditional working class has retreated to a secondary position, replaced by an entirely new social subject, namely the multitude. However, there are also some differences within the autonomist school regarding the criteria for defining the multitude. Hardt, Negri, Lazzarato, and others place greater emphasis on the dimensions of biopolitics and immaterial labor. In Foucault’s work, biopower and biopolitics are still rather ambiguous concepts, sometimes referring to the same thing: the regulation and control of populations and life by power. By the time of Lazzarato, Negri, and others, these two categories have been clearly distinguished, evolving into two opposing categories with definite connotations. In their view, so-called biopower refers to the control of life by capital or state power, corresponding to the logic of capital or state power; biopolitics, on the other hand, is the production of life and the genesis of the subject, a logic of the subject that transcends biopower. In their view, immaterial labor produces knowledge, information, emotions, words, and so on; such immaterial products cannot be produced by machines and can only be completed by relying on the subject’s own life. Therefore, they argue that immaterial labor is essentially a kind of biopolitical labor that produces and reproduces the subject and the social relations between subjects [1]1 Lazzarato, Maurizio. “Immaterial Labor.” In *Radical Thought in Italy: A Potential Politics*, edited by Paolo Virno and Michael Hardt, 133-147. Minneapolis: University of Minnesota Press, 1996.. The so-called multitude is thus the new type of subject that engages in immaterial labor and biopolitical production and is thereby capable of transcending the logic of biopower.

自治主义流派认为,马克思的工人阶级和无产阶级理论是依据物质劳动界定的。在后福特制时代,随着一般智力和非物质劳动的崛起,传统的工人阶级已经退居次要位置,由一个全新的社会主体,即诸众所代替。不过,在诸众的界定标准上,自治主义流派内部也存在一些差异。哈特、奈格里、拉扎拉托等人更强调生命政治和非物质劳动维度。在福柯那里,生命权力和生命政治还是两个比较含混的概念,有时指代同一个意思,即权力对人口和生命的调节与控制。到了拉扎拉托、奈格里等人这里,这两个范畴得到了明确区分,演化为有着明确内涵的两个对立范畴。在他们看来,所谓生命权力是指资本或国家权力对生命的控制,它对应的是资本或国家的权力逻辑;而生命政治则是生命的生产与主体的生成学,是超越生命权力的主体逻辑。在他们看来,非物质劳动生产的是知识、信息、情感、文字,等等;这种非物质产品不可能通过机器生产出来,只有依靠主体自身的生命才能完成。因此,他们认为,非物质劳动在本质上是一种生产和再生产着主体以及主体间社会关系的生命政治劳动[1]。而所谓诸众就是那些从事非物质劳动和生命政治生产、从而能够超越生命权力逻辑的新型主体。

Differing from them, Virno opposes this kind of over-interpretation that detaches concepts from their original context. He neither agrees with rigidly separating biopower and biopolitics nor with constructing “biopolitics” as a positive politics of the subject. In his view, so-called biopolitics is precisely the management and control of life by capital and state power [2]2 Virno, Paolo. *A Grammar of the Multitude: For an Analysis of Contemporary Forms of Life*. Los Angeles: Semiotext(e), 2004.103. Therefore, he does not advocate defining the multitude from the biopolitical dimension, but instead appeals to the “general intellect.” This category comes from Marx’s *Grundrisse der Kritik der politischen Ökonomie* (1857–1858). In Marx’s context, this category has a specific connotation: it is not the simple sum of individual intellects, but the general intellect and “general social knowledge” accumulated through the long-term development of human society [3]3 Marx, Karl. *Grundrisse: Foundations of the Critique of Political Economy*. Translated by Martin Nicolaus. London: Penguin Books, 1973, p. 706.. Virno, however, gives this category a postmodern reconstruction from the subjective dimension, understanding it as all the abilities and potentialities inherent in the subject itself, including cognition, communication, emotion, linguistic exchange, thinking, imagination, and so on [2]2 Virno, Paolo. *A Grammar of the Multitude: For an Analysis of Contemporary Forms of Life*. Los Angeles: Semiotext(e), 2004.84. On this basis, Virno argues that in the post-Fordist era, the general intellect has replaced physical strength of the past, becoming a “universal light” and a “special ether,” the fundamental basis for understanding the social structure of contemporary capitalism. If the people are based on the single foundation of the will of the state, and class is uniformly marked by economic relations and relations of production, then the multitude is primarily based on the general intellect. “The multitude redefines the ‘one.’ In fact, this ‘many’ requires a unified form, it needs to exist as a ‘one.’ But the key point here is: this unity is no longer the state; it is language, intellect, the common faculties of human beings. This ‘one’ is no longer a promise, it is a premise. Unity is no longer that towards which all things converge (the state, the leader), as in the case of the people; rather, it is taken for granted as a background or necessary premise. This ‘multitude’ must be seen as a shared experience, a generic, universal individuation. Therefore, correspondingly, we must conceive of the ‘one’ as far from conclusive, perhaps as a foundation, a foundation that allows for difference, or a foundation that allows this many to be seen as the political-social existence of the existing many.” [2]2 Virno, Paolo. *A Grammar of the Multitude: For an Analysis of Contemporary Forms of Life*. Los Angeles: Semiotext(e), 2004.29 In other words, in the multitude, the relationship between the “one” and the “many” has undergone an important change: the “one” here is no longer the eternal and unchanging ontological promise of traditional metaphysics, but the actual intellect and potentiality inherent in the subject itself; the “one” here is no longer a supreme “essence” that obliterates all differences, but a generic attribute that can be universally individuated and differentiated.

与他们不同,维尔诺反对这种脱离原初语境的过度诠释,他既不同意把生命权力和生命政治僵硬地划分开来,也反对把“生命政治”建构为一种积极的主体政治学。在他看来,所谓生命政治就是资本和国家权力对生命的管理和控制[2]103。因此,他并不主张从生命政治维度来界定诸众,而是诉诸于“一般智力”。这一范畴来自马克思的《1857—1858年经济学手稿》。在马克思的语境中,这一范畴是有着特定内涵的:它不是个人智力的简单相加,而是人类社会长期发展和积累起来的总体智力和“一般社会知识”[3]。而维尔诺则从主体维度对这一范畴进行了后现代重构,将其理解为主体自身所具有的一切能力和潜能,包括认知、交往、情感、语言交流、思考、想象,等等[2]84。在此基础上,维尔诺认为,在后福特制时代,一般智力已经取代了过去的体力,成为一种“普照的光”和“特殊的以太”,成为理解当代资本主义社会结构的根本基础。如果说人民以国家意志为单一基础,阶级以经济关系和生产关系为统一标识,那么,诸众则是以一般智力为主导依据,“诸众对‘一’做了重新定义。实际上这个‘许多’需要一个统一的形式,需要作为‘一’存在。但这里的关键是:这种统一不再是国家;而是语言、智力、人类共有的才能。这个‘一’不再是承诺,它是前提。统一不再是万物向其汇聚的什么(国家、领袖),像人民的那种情况;而是理所当然地作为背景或必要前提。必须把这个‘多数’看成是共享经验的、泛型的、普遍的个性化。因此,与之相应,我们必须设想‘一’远非结论性的东西,也许可以看作一个基础,允许存在差异的基础,或者允许这个许多,被视为存在着的许多的政治-社会存在的基础。”[2]29换言之,在诸众身上,“一”与“多”的关系已经发生了重要变化:这里的“一”不再是传统形而上学式的永恒不变的本体论承诺,而是主体自身所具有的现实智力和潜能本身;这里的“一”不再是抹杀一切差异的至高无上的“本质”,而是可以被普遍个体化、差异化的类属性。

The cognitive capitalism school has raised doubts and criticisms regarding this understanding, arguing that the multitude is in essence still a very ambiguous concept that does not clearly delineate the core characteristics of different strata. Against this backdrop, Franco Berardi, Boudin, Vercellone, and others advocate replacing the traditional categories of the proletariat and the multitude with the “intellectual proletarian,” the “cognitariat,” and the “cognitive worker.”

对于这种理解,认知资本主义流派(cognitive capitalism)提出了质疑和批评,认为诸众在本质上仍是一个非常含混的概念,并没有清晰厘定不同阶层的核心特征。在此背景下,弗朗哥·贝拉蒂、博当、韦塞隆等人主张用“智力无产阶级”(intellectual proletarian)、“认知无产阶级”和“认知工人”来取代传统的无产阶级和诸众范畴。

They have offered a new interpretation based on the distinction between labor power and invention-power. They point out that material labor primarily produces tangible objects, which can be accomplished through the system of machinery. In this process, capital’s exploitation of labor is mainly manifested as capital sucking in physical labor power to realize valorization; this is a form of capital accumulation dominated by dead labor. However, in contemporary capitalist society, the dominant form of production has shifted from material production at the low end of the value chain to knowledge production at the high end. The production of knowledge, information, ideas, and emotions cannot be accomplished by machines and fixed capital; it can only be produced through the subject’s own creativity or the collective brain. At this point, capital places greater emphasis on the exploitation of creativity, general intellect, and collective intelligence. This is a process of using knowledge to produce knowledge, using creativity to produce living knowledge, or in other words, a process of capital accumulation centered on knowledge accumulation. On this basis, Boudon further points out that if physical labor power is consumed in the production process and congealed in the final product, then for creativity, “this living labor, besides being partially consumed as energy and congealed into the new machines of the next cycle, also partially continues to exist as means of production throughout the entire production cycle” [4]4 The “Fragment on Machines” refers to a section of Marx’s *Grundrisse* (1857–1858) in which he discusses the role of general intellect (general social knowledge) in the development of productive forces and the potential for the collapse of capitalism.93. For capital, this living labor is no longer labor power in the traditional sense, but a more advanced “creativity”; it has already become an irreplaceable “living capital” and “intellectual capital” [4]4 The “Fragment on Machines” refers to a section of Marx’s *Grundrisse* (1857–1858) in which he discusses the role of general intellect (general social knowledge) in the development of productive forces and the potential for the collapse of capitalism.93 in the process of contemporary capital accumulation, becoming the dominant source of value creation. Based on the distinction between labor power and creativity, Boudon distinguishes two types of exploitation, namely, Level 1 exploitation and Level 2 exploitation: Level 1 exploitation mainly refers to capital’s exploitation of physical labor power, while Level 2 exploitation refers to capital’s exploitation of creativity. The former is the core characteristic of industrial capitalism, the latter the core characteristic of cognitive capitalism; the former is the key criterion defining the traditional proletariat, the latter the dominant measure defining the cognitive proletariat and cognitive workers [4]4 The “Fragment on Machines” refers to a section of Marx’s *Grundrisse* (1857–1858) in which he discusses the role of general intellect (general social knowledge) in the development of productive forces and the potential for the collapse of capitalism.94. In this regard, cognitive capitalism does not abandon class logic like the autonomist school, but strives to reshape class logic in a new context.

他们从劳动力和创造力(invention-power)的区分入手做了新的阐释。他们指出,物质劳动主要生产有形物,它可以借助机器体系来完成。在这一过程中,资本对劳动的剥削主要表现为资本吮吸体力劳动力进而实现价值增殖,这是一种以死劳动为主导的资本积累形式。但到了当代资本主义社会,生产的主导形式已经从价值链低端的物质生产转换为价值链高端的知识生产,知识、信息、思想、情感等的生产不可能靠机器和固定资本来完成,只有依靠主体自身的创造力或集体大脑才能生产出来。此时资本更加强调对创造力、一般智力和集体智力的剥削,这是一种用知识来生产知识、用创造力来生产活知识的过程,或者说是一种以知识积累为核心的资本积累过程。在此基础上,博当进一步指出,如果说体力劳动力在生产过程中被消耗并凝结在最终产品中,那么,对于创造力来说,“这种活劳动除了部分作为能量被消耗并凝结到下一个循环的新机器中外,还有一部分将继续作为生产资料存在于整个生产周期”[4]93。对资本来说,这种活劳动已不再是传统意义上的劳动力,而是一种更加高级的“创造力”,它已经凸显为当代资本积累过程中不可替代的“活资本”(living capital)和“智力资本”(intellectual capital)[4]93,成为价值创造的主导来源。依据劳动力和创造力的区分,博当区分了两种不同的剥削,即1级剥削和2级剥削:1级剥削主要是指资本对体力劳动力的剥削,2级剥削则是指资本对创造力的剥削。前者是工业资本主义的核心特征,后者则是认知资本主义的核心特征;前者是界定传统无产阶级的核心标准,后者则是界定认知无产阶级和认知工人的主导尺度[4]94。就此而言,认知资本主义并不像自治主义流派那样放弃了阶级逻辑,而是力图在新的语境中重塑阶级逻辑。

However, Boudon points out that due to differences in intelligence and knowledge, cognitive workers have not yet reached the level of a class-for-itself, but constitute a heterogeneous and hierarchically differentiated class-in-itself. “Although knowledge has become raw material, it has led to a genuine differentiation of ‘strata’ (these divisions give rise to new forms of exploitation characterized by Level 2 exploitation). Therefore, knowledge generates a more pronounced and more intense exclusivity than industrial society” [4]4 The “Fragment on Machines” refers to a section of Marx’s *Grundrisse* (1857–1858) in which he discusses the role of general intellect (general social knowledge) in the development of productive forces and the potential for the collapse of capitalism.131. Differences in general intellect and creativity inevitably give rise to differences in labor, thereby producing stratification among laborers themselves.

不过,博当指出,由于智力和知识的差异,决定了认知工人还达不到自为阶级的层次,而是一个参差不齐和等级分化的自在阶层。“虽然知识成了原材料,但却导致了真正的‘阶层’分化(这些划分催生了以2级剥削为特征的新的剥削形式)。因此,知识引发了一种比工业社会更加显著的、更加强烈的排他性”[4]131。一般智力和创造力的差异,必然催生劳动差异,从而在劳动者内部出现阶层分化。

Based on the division between Level 1 and Level 2 exploitation and the degree of freedom of the exploited, Boudon achieves a classification of different strata. Specifically, the exploited mainly include the following types: (1) Slaves and serfs. They suffer Level 1 exploitation and have no freedom at all. (2) Manual workers. Unlike slaves and serfs, they have broken free from relations of personal dependence; they are free individuals who can freely sell their labor power. However, like the former two, they remain at Level 1 exploitation in terms of the exploitation hierarchy. (3) Salaried employees, public officials, and salaried artists, etc. They suffer dual exploitation as both labor power and creativity. However, unlike workers who freely sell their labor power, they resemble servants and have no freedom. (4) The cognitive proletariat and the net-proletariat (pronetariat), etc. If the traditional working class was the main force in the material production process of capitalism, then the cognitive proletariat and net-proletariat in the narrow sense are among the main forces in the knowledge production process of capitalism. They not only produce knowledge commodities but also create surplus value; they not only suffer Level 1 exploitation as labor power but also suffer Level 2 exploitation as creativity. However, unlike public officials, they are free wage laborers. (5) Independent self-employed workers. They are free individuals and do not suffer Level 1 exploitation, but may suffer Level 2 exploitation. (6) Market-dependent cognitive workers. This type of worker is exploited not as physical labor power but as creativity. However, because they are completely dependent on the market and must rely on the market to sustain their livelihood, they are unfree. (7) Cognitive workers freely engaged in creative activities. This type has already broken free from Level 1 exploitation and is mainly subject to Level 2 exploitation. However, unlike the cognitive proletariat in the narrow sense and market-dependent cognitive workers, they have stable wages or other income and do not need to submit to the despotism of the market or capital in order to survive. Therefore, they are no longer dependent cognitive workers, but cognitive workers freely engaged in creative activities in the true sense [4]4 The “Fragment on Machines” refers to a section of Marx’s *Grundrisse* (1857–1858) in which he discusses the role of general intellect (general social knowledge) in the development of productive forces and the potential for the collapse of capitalism.96-97.

依据1级剥削和2级剥削的划分以及被剥削者的自由程度,博当实现了对不同阶层的划分。具体而言,被剥削者主要包括以下几种类型:(1)奴隶和农奴。他们遭受1级剥削,完全没有自由。(2)体力工人。与奴隶、农奴不同,他们已经摆脱了人身依附关系,是自由身,可以自由地出卖自己的劳动力,但与前两者一样,他们在剥削层级上仍处于1级剥削。(3)受雇的职员、公职人员和领薪的艺术家等。他们作为劳动力和创造力遭受双重剥削,不过,与自由出卖劳动力的工人不同,他们类似于仆人,没有自由。(4)认知无产阶级和网络无产阶级(pronetariat)等。如果说传统工人阶级是资本主义物质生产过程的主力军,那么,狭义上的认知无产阶级和网络无产阶级则是资本主义知识生产过程的主要力量之一,他们不仅生产知识商品,同时也创造着剩余价值;他们不仅作为劳动力遭受1级剥削,同时也作为创造力遭受2级剥削。不过,与公职人员不同,他们属于自由的雇佣劳动者。(5)独立的自主从业者。他们是自由身,不会遭受1级剥削,但可能会遭受2级剥削。(6)依赖于市场的认知工人。这类工人不是作为体力劳动力而是作为创造力被剥削的,不过,由于他们完全依附于市场,要依靠市场来维持自己的生计,因此,他们是不自由的。(7)自由从事创造性活动的认知工人。这类人已经摆脱了1级剥削,主要受2级剥削。不过,与狭义的认知无产阶级和依赖市场的认知工人不同,他们拥有稳定的工资或其他收入,不需要为了生存而屈从于市场或资本的专制,因此,他们不再是依附性的认知工人,而是真正意义上的自由从事创造性活动的认知工人[4]96-97。

From this perspective, in the view of cognitive capitalism, there are still clear differences in connotation and class composition between cognitive workers and the cognitive proletariat; the former is broader than the latter. In contemporary capitalist society, all cognitive laborers are part of the cognitive workers, while the cognitive proletariat is the directly employed workers among the cognitive workers. In other words, cognitive workers are a cognitive stratum with internal hierarchical divisions, while the cognitive proletariat is that part of cognitive workers who directly sell their creativity, are dominated by capital, and create surplus value. In their view, although physical labor power and the traditional proletariat also exist in cognitive capitalist society, they are no longer the dominant force in that society; cognitive workers and the cognitive proletariat have replaced the former and become the new subjects of liberation struggle in the era of cognitive capitalism.

以此来看,在认知资本主义看来,认知工人和认知无产阶级在内涵和阶层构成上还是存在明显区别的,前者比后者更宽泛。在当代资本主义社会,所有认知劳动者都属于认知工人的组成部分,而认知无产阶级则是认知工人中的直接雇佣工人;或者说,认知工人是内部存在等级划分的认知阶层,而认知无产阶级则是直接出卖自己的创造力、受资本支配并创造剩余价值的那部分认知工人。在他们看来,虽然认知资本主义社会中也存在体力劳动力和传统意义上的无产阶级,但他们已经不再是认知资本主义社会的主导力量;认知工人和认知无产阶级已经取代了前者,成为认知资本主义时代解放斗争的新主体。

II. New Contradictions Arising from Intellect and New Strategies of Struggle

二、智力引发的新矛盾与新的斗争策略

In the “Fragment on Machines,” Marx argued that with the development of general intellect, the creation of wealth would increasingly depend on the application of science and technology, and less on labor time. Once labor declined to a certain point, the labor theory of value would lose its validity, and the system of exchange-value production and the capitalist system would collapse. Contemporary Western leftists believe that the development of contemporary capitalism has proven Marx’s judgment of that time to be “a mixed blessing”: the development of general intellect has not led to the collapse of the exchange-value production system and the capitalist system as Marx predicted, but has instead given rise to a new form of capitalism based on general intellect and the knowledge theory of value. However, in their view, although contemporary capitalism has transcended the industrial capitalist form, it has not overcome the inherent contradictions of capitalism; rather, it has reproduced and developed these contradictions at a higher level, and on this basis, they have proposed new strategies of struggle.

在“机器论片断”中,马克思认为,随着一般智力的发展,财富的创造将越来越取决于科学和技术的运用,较少地取决于劳动时间,一旦劳动下降到一定程度,劳动价值论便会失去效力,交换价值生产制度和资本主义制度就将崩溃。当代西方左翼认为,当代资本主义的发展实践证明,马克思当年的判断“毁誉参半”:一般智力的发展并没有像马克思预想的那样导致交换价值生产制度和资本主义制度的崩溃,反而催生了一种以一般智力和知识价值论为基础的资本主义新形态。不过,在他们看来,当代资本主义虽然超越了工业资本主义形态,但它并没有克服资本主义的内在矛盾,而是在更高的层次上再现和发展了这种矛盾,并在此基础上提出了新的斗争策略。

First, there is the contradiction between the public nature of intellect and the nationalization and capitalization of intellect. Virno believes that general intellect is the ability and potential of the subject itself, while knowledge is the objectified product of human intellect; in essence, both belong to the common property of humanity. This public nature constitutes the essential attribute of general intellect and knowledge. However, in contemporary Western society, the combination of intellect with the existing production system and state power has led to a dual alienation of intellect. On the one hand, there is the paradox between the public nature of intellect and the capitalization of intellect. Virno points out: “Once intellect is linked to wage labor, its typical public nature is also controlled and distorted. This public nature is repeatedly evoked in its role as a productive force; and repeatedly suppressed as a different principle, as the root of potential political action in its role as the public sphere (in the proper sense of the word).”[2]2 Virno, Paolo. *A Grammar of the Multitude: For an Analysis of Contemporary Forms of Life*. Los Angeles: Semiotext(e), 2004.85 Intellect is the basis of social cooperation, and the scope of this cooperation is broader than the scope of cooperation that labor can determine. However, under capitalist conditions, the cooperation of intellect is not completed through the autonomous combination of subjects, but is forcibly constructed through the mediation of wage labor. As a result, intellect loses its autonomy and public nature, “playing the role of the most outstanding resource of capitalist cooperative action… the situation turns into its opposite, because the emergence of intellect becomes the technical precondition of labor… what follows is: conversely, intellect is incorporated into the management norms and hierarchical structures that characterize the factory management system.”[2]2 Virno, Paolo. *A Grammar of the Multitude: For an Analysis of Contemporary Forms of Life*. Los Angeles: Semiotext(e), 2004.85 Through this transformation, all intellectual laborers are deprived of autonomy and incorporated into “a dense network of hierarchical relationships,”[2]2 Virno, Paolo. *A Grammar of the Multitude: For an Analysis of Contemporary Forms of Life*. Los Angeles: Semiotext(e), 2004.85-86 leading to a dual subjugation of the intellectual subject in terms of personality and individuality. On the other hand, there is the paradox between the public nature of intellect and the nationalization of intellect. Virno points out: “While intellect is being exploited as a productive force, its unique public nature is also deprived of its authentic expression by labor, and can only be indirectly manifested within the state through the hypertrophic proliferation of administrative organs. Administration is no longer political parliamentarism, but the core of the state: in fact, this is the case, because administration embodies the dictatorial condensation of general intellect, the point of convergence between knowledge and control, the reflection of excessive cooperation.”[2]2 Virno, Paolo. *A Grammar of the Multitude: For an Analysis of Contemporary Forms of Life*. Los Angeles: Semiotext(e), 2004.85-86 With the concrete application of knowledge in administration, the state itself is not only rationalized, but intellect is gradually nationalized as well. “Hobbes clearly understood the principle of the rationalization of absolute power when the natural rights of each individual are transferred to the sovereign ruler; on the other hand, we should speak of the transfer of intellect, more precisely, the transfer of the irreducible public nature of intellect itself into the state administration,”[2]2 Virno, Paolo. *A Grammar of the Multitude: For an Analysis of Contemporary Forms of Life*. Los Angeles: Semiotext(e), 2004.86 causing the public nature of intellect to gradually atrophy.

首先,是智力的公共性与智力的国家化和资本化之间的矛盾。维尔诺认为,一般智力是主体自身的能力和潜能,而知识则是人类智力客观化的产物,它们在本质上都属于人类的共有之物。这种公共性构成了一般智力和知识的本质属性。然而,在当代西方社会,智力与现有的生产制度和国家权力的结合,导致了智力的双重异化。一方面是智力的公共性与智力的资本化之间的悖论。维尔诺指出:“智力一旦联系到雇佣劳动,其典型的公共性也就会受到控制和扭曲。这种公共性一遍又一遍地以其生产力的角色被唤起;而一遍又一遍地以其公共领域的角色(从该词的恰当意义上说)当作潜在的政治行动的根源、当作不同的原则被镇压下去。”[2]85智力是社会合作的基础,这种合作的范围要比劳动所能确定的合作范围更加广泛。然而,在资本主义条件下,智力的合作却不是主体自主结合完成的,而是以雇佣劳动为中介被迫建构起来的,结果,智力失去了自己的自主性和公共性,“扮演了资本主义合作行动最杰出的资源……情况走向了反面,由于智力的出现成为劳动的技术前提……由此带来的是:反过来却将智力纳入了作为工厂管理体制特征的管理准则和层次结构”[2]85。经过这种转化,所有的智力劳动者都被取消了自主性,被纳入 “等级体系紧密的关系网”[2]85-86,导致智力主体在个性和人格上的双重臣服。另一方面,是智力的公共性与智力的国家化之间的悖论。维尔诺指出:“智力在被开拓成生产力的同时,其独具的公共性也被劳动剥夺了自身的真实表达,只能通过行政机构肥厚性增生的方式在国家范围内做间接的体现。行政管理不再是政治议会制,而是国家性的核心:但实际上就是如此,因为行政管理体现了一般智力的独裁聚结,是知识和控制之间的融汇点,是过度合作的倒影。”[2]85-86随着知识在行政管理中的具体运用,国家本身不仅合理化了,智力也逐渐被国家化了,“霍布斯清楚每一个单独个体的天赋人权转移到至高无上的统治者手里时绝对权力合理化的原则;另一方面,我们该谈智力的转移,更精确地说,智力本身的、不可约的公共性转移到国家的行政管理”[2]86中去了,致使智力的公共性逐步萎缩。

Second, there is the contradiction between dead knowledge and living knowledge. In Marx’s view, the inversion of the capitalist material production process is mainly manifested in the inversion between dead labor and living labor. Cognitive capitalism believes that Marx’s judgment applies only to the material labor process; if it is based on the process of knowledge production and cognitive labor, Marx’s judgment is far from sufficient. Boudin points out that in the era of cognitive capitalism, for capital to exploit this creativity, general intellect, and collective intellect, it is no longer enough to gather living labor on the production line and fully objectify their intellect into products or transform it into a component of dead labor. For capital, what is more crucial is to always maintain the expropriation of this living creativity of living labor itself, rather than turning it into completely objectified “dead knowledge.”[4]4 The “Fragment on Machines” refers to a section of Marx’s *Grundrisse* (1857–1858) in which he discusses the role of general intellect (general social knowledge) in the development of productive forces and the potential for the collapse of capitalism.163 Therefore, if the contradiction of industrial capitalism is represented by the opposition between dead labor and living labor represented by capital, then in the era of cognitive capitalism, “the opposition between dead labor and living labor under traditional industrial capitalism gives way to a new form of antagonism, namely, the opposition between the dead knowledge of capital and the ‘living knowledge’ of labor.”[5]5 “Biopolitics” (生命政治) refers to a concept developed by Michel Foucault, later taken up by Italian autonomist thinkers like Antonio Negri and Paolo Virno, denoting a form of power that manages and regulates life, populations, and biological processes, as opposed to the sovereign power over death. In this context, its “return” signifies a political strategy centered on the self-organization of living labor and the common.33

其次,是死知识与活知识之间的矛盾。在马克思看来,资本主义物质生产过程的颠倒性主要表现为死劳动与活劳动之间的颠倒。认知资本主义认为,马克思的这一判断只是针对物质劳动过程而言的,如果是基于知识生产和认识劳动过程,马克思的这一判断就远远不够了。博当指出,在认知资本主义时代,资本若要实现对这种创造力、一般智力和集体智力的剥削,再把活劳动聚集在生产线上,将他们的智力完全对象化在产品中或转化为死劳动的组成部分,已经远远不够了。对资本来说,更为关键的是,要始终保持对活劳动自身的这种活的创造力的剥夺,而不是把它们变成完全客观化的“死知识”[4]163。因此,如果说工业资本主义的矛盾表现为资本所代表的死劳动与活劳动之间的对立,那么,在认知资本主义时代,“传统工业资本主义下的死劳动与活劳动之间的对立,让位于一种新的对抗形式,即资本的死知识和劳动的‘活知识’之间的对立”[5]33。

Third, there is the contradiction between the privatization of intellectual property and the socialization of knowledge production. Cognitive capitalism points out that in the era of Marx and Engels, the issue of intellectual property had not yet emerged; therefore, the private ownership of the means of production they discussed mainly referred to the private ownership of material means of production. However, in contemporary capitalist society, the issue of intellectual property and its privatization has become a major problem that cannot be avoided. If Virno mainly analyzed the social contradictions of contemporary capitalism from the paradox between the public nature and exclusivity of intellect and knowledge, then cognitive capitalism goes a step further, focusing on analyzing the new contradictions caused by the privatization of intellectual property. They point out that with globalization and the adjustment of the global industrial structure, large enterprises and corporations in contemporary capitalism are constantly seizing the mid-to-high-end links of the global industrial value chain, thereby forming a capital accumulation model centered on knowledge and innovation,[4]4 The “Fragment on Machines” refers to a section of Marx’s *Grundrisse* (1857–1858) in which he discusses the role of general intellect (general social knowledge) in the development of productive forces and the potential for the collapse of capitalism.56 which is “a completely new stage of primitive accumulation of capital.”[5]5 “Biopolitics” (生命政治) refers to a concept developed by Michel Foucault, later taken up by Italian autonomist thinkers like Antonio Negri and Paolo Virno, denoting a form of power that manages and regulates life, populations, and biological processes, as opposed to the sovereign power over death. In this context, its “return” signifies a political strategy centered on the self-organization of living labor and the common.33 If industrial capitalism uses commodities to produce commodities, then cognitive capitalism uses knowledge to produce knowledge, and uses living people to produce living knowledge. Under these conditions, knowledge production, or the cognitive labor that produces knowledge, has in fact become subordinate to capital. Capital expropriates the creativity of cognitive workers to carry out knowledge production, and privatizes the fruits of their cooperation or collective intellectual achievements in the form of property rights. On the one hand, this achieves the expropriation of the intellectual labor achievements of others, constructing a new intellectual property relationship; on the other hand, “it hinders the progress of knowledge by artificially creating resource scarcity… blocking the source of the process of knowledge accumulation and dissemination.”[5]5 “Biopolitics” (生命政治) refers to a concept developed by Michel Foucault, later taken up by Italian autonomist thinkers like Antonio Negri and Paolo Virno, denoting a form of power that manages and regulates life, populations, and biological processes, as opposed to the sovereign power over death. In this context, its “return” signifies a political strategy centered on the self-organization of living labor and the common.34-35 Therefore, to reveal the internal contradictions of the contemporary capitalist production process, it is necessary not only to examine the contradiction between the private ownership of material means of production and the socialization of production, but also to systematically reveal the internal contradiction between the capitalist privatization of intellectual property and the socialization of production, thereby achieving a critique of the political economy of the privatization of intellectual property.

再次,是知识产权私有化与知识生产社会化之间的矛盾。认知资本主义指出,在马克思恩格斯生活的时代,知识产权问题还没有出现,因此,他们所说的生产资料私有制主要是指物质生产资料私有制。然而,到了当代资本主义社会,知识产权及其私有化问题,已经成为当代资本主义社会不可回避的重大问题。如果说维尔诺主要从智力和知识的公共性与排他性之间的悖论剖析了当代资本主义的社会矛盾,那么,认知资本主义则更进一步,重点分析了知识产权私有化所导致的新矛盾。他们指出,随着全球化和全球产业结构的调整,当代资本主义的大企业和公司不断抢占全球产业价值链的中高端环节,进而形成了以知识和创新力为核心的资本积累模式[4]56,这是一种“全新的资本原始积累阶段”[5]33。如果说工业资本主义是用商品来生产商品,那么,认知资本主义则是用知识来生产知识,用活人来生产活知识。在这种条件下,知识生产或者说生产知识的认知劳动已经在实际上从属于资本了。资本通过剥夺认知工人的创造力进行知识生产,并以产权的形式将他们的合作成果或集体智力成果私有化,一方面实现了对他人智力劳动成果的剥夺,建构了一种新的知识产权关系;另一方面“通过人为制造资源的稀缺性来阻碍知识的进步……阻断知识积累和传播过程的源头”[5]34-35。因此,要揭示当代资本主义生产过程的内在矛盾,不仅要考察物质生产资料私有制与生产社会化之间的矛盾,更要系统揭示资本主义知识产权私有化与生产社会化之间的内在矛盾,实现对知识产权私有化的政治经济学批判。

The autonomist and cognitive capitalism schools believe that under new historical conditions, the social subject has changed, and the social contradictions of capitalism have also changed; therefore, the strategy of struggle must inevitably change accordingly. Combining these new social contradictions, the autonomist and cognitive capitalism schools have proposed new strategies of struggle from the perspectives of the multitude and cognitive workers, respectively.

自治主义和认知资本主义流派认为,在新的历史条件下,社会主体变了,资本主义社会矛盾也变了,那么,斗争策略也必然要随之改变。自治主义和认知资本主义流派结合新的社会矛盾,分别从诸众和认知工人的角度,提出了新的斗争策略。

First, cooperative autonomy and the return of biopolitics.

第一,合作自治和生命政治的回归。

When it comes to the development of labor productivity, the usual explanation is Smith’s theory of the division of labor, which refers to “the cooperation of many workers, who produce the various parts of the same commodity, under the command of a single capital, where each particular part of the commodity requires a particular kind of labor, that is, a particular operation, and each worker or group of workers merely completes some particular operation, while other workers complete other operations, and so on.”[6]6 Karl Marx, *Capital*, Vol. 1, in *Marx and Engels Collected Works*, Vol. 44, p. 301. The original Chinese citation is to a Chinese edition; the English edition reference is supplied for the reader.301 This division of labor is not formed voluntarily or autonomously by the workers, but is forcibly constructed under the dominance of capital. In this division of labor, the cooperation of workers can only form a general productive force subordinate to capital, and cannot produce the subjectivity or autonomy of the workers. Autonomism and cognitive capitalism argue that Smith’s theory of the division of labor is effective for explaining material production labor, but is clearly no longer applicable to intellectual labor, cognitive labor, and immaterial labor. If from the era of large-scale machine production to the Fordist era, the capitalist material production process sought to turn people into appendages of machines, achieving the de-subjectification of the labor process, then the labor process of the post-Fordist era is precisely the opposite: it must fully mobilize people’s subjectivity, initiative, and creativity. If traditional material labor produces things and material commodities, and this production of things can be entirely completed by machines, even if people are turned into things it does not matter—and indeed this is the case—then contemporary immaterial labor produces knowledge, information, emotions, texts, and so on. Such immaterial products cannot be completed by machines; they can only be achieved through the cooperation of the subjects themselves. Therefore, to produce immaterial products, it is clearly impossible to continue following Smith’s theory of the division of labor by fixing workers to specific procedures and production lines. More importantly, unlike physical labor, immaterial labor, intellectual labor, and cognitive labor themselves require the participation of the subject, and in the labor process they produce and reproduce the subject as well as the social relations between subjects (cooperation, communication, emotions, etc.). Thus, even if the initial cooperation among immaterial laborers is forcibly constructed under the dominance of capital, in the course of labor, “capital can never organize the relations of production in cooperation,”[7]7 Paolo Virno, *A Grammar of the Multitude*, p. 87. The original Chinese citation is to a Chinese edition; the English edition reference is supplied for the reader. and the subjects themselves will produce a new form of cooperation external to capital, realizing a transformation from forced cooperation under the logic of capital to autonomous cooperation among subjects; from biopower to biopolitics.

一提到劳动生产力的发展,通常流行的解释是斯密的劳动分工理论,它指的是“生产同一种商品的各个不同部分的许多工人在一个资本的指挥下的协作,其中商品的每一个特殊部分要求一种特殊的劳动,即特殊的操作,每一个工人或每一组工人,只是完成某种特殊的操作,别的工人完成其他的操作,如此等等。”[6]301这种分工并不是工人自愿、自主形成的,而是在资本的主导下被迫建构起来的。在这种分工中,工人的合作只可能形成一种屈从于资本的总体生产力,而不会生产出工人的主体性和自主性。自治主义和认知资本主义认为,斯密的劳动分工理论用于解释物质生产劳动是有效的,但对于智力劳动、认知劳动和非物质劳动而言,显然已经不适用了。如果说从机器大生产到福特制时代,资本主义物质生产过程都力图把人变成机器的附属物,实现劳动过程的去主体化,那么,后福特制时代的劳动过程则恰恰相反,而是要充分调动人的主体性、积极性和创造性。如果说传统的物质劳动生产的是物和物质商品,而这种物的生产完全可以通过机器来完成,即使把人变成物也无关紧要;事实上也的确如此。那么,当代非物质劳动生产的则是知识、信息、情感、文字,等等;这种非物质产品是不可能通过机器完成的,只有依靠主体自身的合作才有可能。因此,要生产非物质产品,若再按照斯密的分工理论,把劳动者固定在特定的程序和生产线上,显然是无法实现的;更重要的是,不同于体力劳动,非物质劳动、智力劳动和认知劳动本身就需要主体的参与,并在劳动过程中生产和再生产着主体以及主体间的社会关系(合作、交往、情感,等等)。所以,即便非物质劳动者之间的最初合作是在资本的主导下被迫建构起来的,但在劳动的过程中,“资本决不能对生产合作关系加以组织”[7],而主体自身就会生产出一种外在于资本的全新的合作形式,实现从资本逻辑主导下的被迫合作到主体自主合作;从生命权力到生命政治的逻辑转变。

Second, non-cooperation and exit.

第二,不合作主义和退出。

How can intellect escape the constraints of capital and state power and return to its own commonality? Virno points out: “As long as it uncouples itself from the dovetailing with commodity production and wage labor, it is itself an autonomous public sphere. On the other hand, the subversion of capitalist relations of production can only be manifested with the establishment of a public sphere that does not operate through the state, with the establishment of a political community that relies on the general intellect.”[2]2 Virno, Paolo. *A Grammar of the Multitude: For an Analysis of Contemporary Forms of Life*. Los Angeles: Semiotext(e), 2004.87 To achieve this transformation, the multitude needs new strategies of struggle, namely “non-cooperation and exit.”[2]2 Virno, Paolo. *A Grammar of the Multitude: For an Analysis of Contemporary Forms of Life*. Los Angeles: Semiotext(e), 2004.88 Non-cooperation is the basic form of political action for the multitude; it is “an unwillingness to be more deeply loyal to the control of the state.” “The birthplace of non-cooperation lies not only in social struggles that express protest, but especially in those places that express betrayal.”[2]2 Virno, Paolo. *A Grammar of the Multitude: For an Analysis of Contemporary Forms of Life*. Los Angeles: Semiotext(e), 2004.89 In other words, non-cooperation is not just a verbal protest, but an actual “rebellion” against power; “not offering opinions, but exiting”[2]2 Virno, Paolo. *A Grammar of the Multitude: For an Analysis of Contemporary Forms of Life*. Los Angeles: Semiotext(e), 2004.89—that is, all the multitude unite, strive to change the rules of the game, continuously exit from the operational mechanisms of capital and state power, allowing their own intellect and potential to return to common attributes, achieving the common appropriation of the general intellect, and thereby “prevent this abundant knowledge from being ‘transferred’ to the administrative power of the state, prevent its structure from serving as a production resource for capitalist enterprises.”[2]2 Virno, Paolo. *A Grammar of the Multitude: For an Analysis of Contemporary Forms of Life*. Los Angeles: Semiotext(e), 2004.91

智力如何才能摆脱资本和国家权力的制约,回归自身的公共性呢?维尔诺指出:“只要将自己与商品生产和雇佣劳动之间的榫接拆开,自己就是自主的公共领域。另一方面,资本主义生产关系的颠覆只能随着非国家运行的公共领域的建立、随着依靠一般智力的政治共同体的建立方能体现出来。”[2]87而要实现这一转变,诸众需要新的斗争策略,即“不合作主义和退出”[2]88。不合作主义是诸众政治行动的基本形式,是“对更深地忠于国家的控制表示不情愿”,“不合作的发源地并不只存在于表达抗议的社会斗争里,而且尤其存在于那些表达背叛的地方”[2]89。换言之,不合作主义不只是一种口头上的抗议,而是以实际行动表达对权力的“反叛”;“不是提意见,而是退出”[2]89,即所有诸众联合起来,努力改变游戏规则,不断从资本和国家权力的运作机制中退出来,使自身的智力和潜能回归公共属性,实现对一般智力的共同占有,进而“阻止这种充裕的知识‘转移’到国家行政权力中去,阻止它的结构作为资本主义企业的生产资源”[2]91。

Third, cognitive workers and the network alliance.

第三,认知工人与网络的联合。

The exploitation of creativity constitutes the core of cognitive capitalism, and the privatization of intellectual property is an inevitable product of the capitalist knowledge production process. How, then, can cognitive workers escape this exploitation? The cognitive capitalism school pins its hopes on the alliance of cognitive workers and networks. They argue: “Today, the core of value, the most typical characteristic of productive labor, is the creative activity of the brain.”[4]4 The “Fragment on Machines” refers to a section of Marx’s *Grundrisse* (1857–1858) in which he discusses the role of general intellect (general social knowledge) in the development of productive forces and the potential for the collapse of capitalism.163 To complete the exploitation of this creativity, it is impossible to adopt the hierarchical cooperation model of Taylorism and Fordism; it is necessary to rely on modern network information technology to fully mobilize the initiative and subjectivity of cognitive workers, achieving a transformation from a vertical cooperation model to a horizontal cooperation model. “The organizational form that makes innovation possible is horizontal cooperation, and the latter is only possible with the help of the internet and digital tools. Without horizontal cooperation, there is no innovation, or it cannot be said to be innovation; without the internet, the cost of organizing decentralized horizontal cooperation would be astronomical; without computers and digital tools, considering the poor computing power of the human brain, memory capacity and information processing efficiency would be low and limited.”[4]4 The “Fragment on Machines” refers to a section of Marx’s *Grundrisse* (1857–1858) in which he discusses the role of general intellect (general social knowledge) in the development of productive forces and the potential for the collapse of capitalism.163 Only by relying on modern information technology can human brains unite to form a collective brain and collective intellect, radiating enormous creativity. And when capital uses this form of cooperation to exploit the creativity of cognitive workers, it also opens up a new path to break through capitalist relations of production. In other words, the development of the internet and information communication technology provides the technical support for cognitive workers to escape the capitalist wage-labor mechanism. Boudon points out that with the integration of cognitive workers and modern information technology, all cognitive workers will unite in the network, forming a huge “human cloud.” Each cognitive worker can find work entirely through the internet, no longer needing to be constrained by a specific work environment or specific capital as before, thus forming a completely new work mechanism, which will inevitably pose a huge challenge to the capitalist wage-labor system. More importantly, cognitive workers themselves constitute a cognitive class composed of different strata; the possibility of uniting in reality is relatively slim. But by relying on the internet, it is precisely possible to break down internal class divisions and achieve a true union of creativity. Once this point is reached, all cognitive workers will re-appropriate their own creativity and collective intellect, thus breaking through the cage of capitalist relations of production, eliminating the restrictions of intellectual property and its privatization, and achieving the socialized union of knowledge production and the true sharing of knowledge wealth.

对创造力的剥削构成了认知资本主义的核心,而知识产权私有化是资本主义知识生产过程的必然产物。那么,认知工人如何才能摆脱这种剥削呢?认知资本主义流派将其寄托于认知工人和网络的联合。他们认为,“今天,价值的核心即生产劳动最为典型的特征是大脑的创造性活动”[4]163,而要完成对这种创造力的剥削,再像泰勒制和福特制那样采用等级化的合作模式是不可能实现的,必须借助现代网络信息技术,充分调动认知工人的积极性和主体性,实现从垂直式合作模式向水平式合作模式的转变,“创新成为可能的组织形式就是水平式合作,而后者只有借助于互联网和数字化工具才有可能。没有水平式合作,就没有创新,或者就谈不上创新;没有互联网,组织去中心化的水平式合作的成本就是天文数字;没有计算机和数字化工具,考虑人类大脑贫乏的计算能力,记忆能力和信息处理效率就是低下的和有限的。”[4]163只有借助现代信息技术,人类大脑才能结为一体,形成集体脑和集体智力,散发出巨大的创造力。而当资本借助这种合作形式来剥夺认知工人创造力的时候,也就开启了一种冲破资本主义生产关系的新路径。或者说,互联网和信息通讯技术的发展,为认知工人摆脱资本主义雇佣劳动机制提供了技术支撑。博当指出,随着认知工人与现代信息技术的融合,所有认知工人会在网络中联合起来,形成一个巨大的“人力云”,每个认知工人完全可以通过互联网找到工作,不必再像以前那样受制于特定的工作环境,受制于特定的资本,从而形成一种全新的工作机制,这必将对资本主义雇佣劳动制度产生巨大挑战。更为重要的是,认知工人本身就是由不同等级构成的认知阶层,在现实中联合起来的可能性是较为渺茫的,而借助于互联网,恰恰可以打破内部等级的划分,实现创造力的真正联合。一旦到了这一步,所有认知工人就会重新占有自身的创造力和集体智力,从而冲破资本主义生产关系的牢笼,破除知识产权及其私有化的限制,实现知识生产的社会化联合和知识财富的真正共享。

In short, their strategy is this: all immaterial laborers and the multitude unite, re-appropriate the general intellect, and achieve subject autonomy! All cognitive workers and the cognitive proletariat unite, and become the masters of their own creativity and collective intellect!

总之,一句话,他们的策略就是:所有的非物质劳动者和诸众联合起来,重新占有一般智力,实现主体自治!所有的认知工人和认知无产阶级联合起来,成为自身创造力和集体智力的主人!

III. What Relationship Exists Between Intellect and Class: The Diagnosis of Marx and Engels

三、智力与阶级存在何种关系:马克思恩格斯的诊断

How should we view the contemporary Western left-wing understanding of the relationship between intellect and class? To answer this question, we must first clarify the judgment of Marx and Engels on this issue.

如何看待当代西方左翼关于智力与阶级关系的认识呢?要回答这一问题,我们必须首先厘清马克思恩格斯对这一问题的判断。

First, is intellect the basis for dividing ranks and classes? In class society, the division between mental and manual labour is often expressed in the form of class antagonism, so it is easy to form the impression that mental labourers seem to belong to the ruling class, while manual labourers seem to belong to the ruled class. This understanding has a certain validity in a given historical period, but it would be an exaggeration to elevate the distinction between manual and mental labour into the dominant criterion by which Marx and Engels defined class. Class is an economic category; it is an essential division made on the basis of relations of production and social relations. Intellect, by contrast, is merely a common attribute possessed by human beings themselves; it is not the logical basis for dividing class. To use Marx’s own words, intellect is “an attribute which I share with everyone else, which I possess to the same degree as everyone else, and which therefore constitutes neither my character, nor my special talent, nor my particular essence.” Hence, “intellect does not make a person a member of an estate; it merely makes the member of an estate a person.”[8]8 Karl Marx, “Debates on the Law on Theft of Wood,” *Marx and Engels Collected Works*, Vol. 1, pp. 338, 339, 343. (The original Chinese text cites these pages from the Chinese edition of the *Collected Works*.)338 On this basis, Marx drew an important conclusion: “intellect is by no means a characteristic of the estate; on the contrary, the estate is a characteristic of the intellect.”[8]8 Karl Marx, “Debates on the Law on Theft of Wood,” *Marx and Engels Collected Works*, Vol. 1, pp. 338, 339, 343. (The original Chinese text cites these pages from the Chinese edition of the *Collected Works*.)339 Intellect is a common attribute of humanity, while estates and classes are social categories; a common generic attribute cannot serve as the dominant criterion for estate or class identity. Conversely, as a generic attribute of humanity, intellect acquires a specific social character because of the relations of production and social relations in which it is situated, thereby taking on specific forms and specific content. Those who possess intellect are divided into different estates according to the positions and relations they occupy. In other words, intellect is not the criterion for dividing estates and classes; rather, estates and classes are, conversely, the important criteria for understanding the form of operation and the characteristics of intellect. It is not a matter of making estates and classes “adapt to intellect, but of making intellect adapt to them,” just as a clockmaker cannot correct the sun by his clock, but can only correct his clock by the sun.[8]8 Karl Marx, “Debates on the Law on Theft of Wood,” *Marx and Engels Collected Works*, Vol. 1, pp. 338, 339, 343. (The original Chinese text cites these pages from the Chinese edition of the *Collected Works*.)343

第一,智力是划分等级和阶级的依据吗?在阶级社会中,脑力劳动与体力劳动的分工往往是以阶级对立的形式表现出来的,因而很容易形成这样一种印象:脑力劳动者似乎属于统治阶级,体力劳动者似乎属于被统治阶级。这种认识在一定的历史时期是有其合理性的,但如果将体力劳动和脑力劳动之分上升为马克思恩格斯界定阶级的主导尺度,就有些言过其实了。阶级是一个经济范畴,它是依据生产关系和社会关系做出的本质划分,而智力不过是人自身所具有的一种共有属性,并不是划分阶级逻辑的依据。用马克思的话来说,智力是“我和大家共有的、我和大家在同样程度上具备的属性,既不构成我的性格,也不构成我的特长,也不构成我的特殊本质”,因此,“智力并不使人成为等级代表制的成员,它只是使等级代表制的成员成为人”[8]338。在此基础上,马克思得出了一个重要结论,即“智力决不是等级的特性”,相反,“等级是智力的特性”[8]339。智力是人类的共有属性,而等级和阶级则是社会范畴,共有的类属性不可能成为等级和阶级身份的主导尺度;反过来,作为人的类属性,智力会由于所处的生产关系和社会关系不同而被赋予特殊的社会属性,从而具有特定的形式和特定的内容,而那些拥有智力的人会由于他们所处的地位和关系的不同而被划分为不同等级。换句话说,智力不是划分等级和阶级的尺度,而等级和阶级反过来却是理解智力的作用形式及其特性的重要标准;不是使等级和阶级“去适应智力,而是使智力适应它”,正像一个钟表匠,不能根据自己的钟表来校正太阳,而只能根据太阳来校正他的钟表一样[8]343。

Second, what is the form of operation of intellect in the spheres of capitalist material production and immaterial production? Constrained by the capitalist mode of production, the form of operation of intellect also exhibits its own particularity. Marx and Engels analysed this concretely from the spheres of material production and immaterial production respectively. With regard to the sphere of material production, Marx and Engels argued that capital will fully utilise and appropriate the accumulated social intellect and scientific knowledge, transforming them into the system of machinery and fixed capital, thereby achieving intellectual control over the material production process, causing the majority of industrial workers to become appendages of the machinery system, and realising the separation of social intellect from the labour process.[9]9 Karl Marx, *Capital*, Vol. 1, and the *Grundrisse*. For this portion of industrial workers, their labour process gradually degenerates into increasingly monotonous, de-intellectualised manual labour, and this portion of industrial workers also constitutes the main force of the modern working class as Marx and Engels understood it. However, can we assert that the proletariat in Marx and Engels’ sense refers exclusively to industrial workers? The answer is no, and this brings us to the question of immaterial labour.

第二,智力在资本主义物质生产和非物质生产领域中的作用形式是什么?由于资本主义生产方式的限制,智力的作用形式也呈现出自身的特殊性,马克思恩格斯分别从物质生产和非物质生产领域对此展开了具体分析。就物质生产领域而言,马克思恩格斯认为,资本将会充分利用和占有社会积累起来的智力和科学知识,将其转化为机器体系和固定资本,进而实现对物质生产过程的智力控制,导致大部分产业工人沦为机器体系的附属物,实现社会智力与劳动过程的分离[9]。对这部分产业工人而言,他们的劳动过程逐渐退化为越来越单调的去智力化的体力劳动,而这部分产业工人也构成了马克思恩格斯所说的现代工人阶级的主力军。但是,我们能否断言说马克思恩格斯意义上的无产阶级就是指产业工人呢?答案是否定的,这就涉及非物质劳动问题。

When Marx and Engels shifted their perspective from the sphere of material production to the sphere of immaterial production, they saw a new form of operation of intellect, namely the question of immaterial labour and intellectual production. They divided this production into three types. The first type is the intellectual labour of the bourgeoisie and its spokespersons. The ideas of the ruling class are in every epoch the ruling ideas; “hence, within this class, one part appears as the thinkers of the class (its active, conceptive ideologists, who make the perfecting of the illusion of the class about itself their chief source of livelihood).”[10]10 Karl Marx and Frederick Engels, *The German Ideology*, in *Marx and Engels Collected Works*, Vol. 5, p. 59. This type of immaterial labourer constitutes the spokesperson of the ruling class. The second type consists of those who engage in intellectual production autonomously. Their intellect has not yet been subordinated to the logic of capital. They can give full play to their intelligence, talents and special skills, autonomously engaging in various immaterial production activities such as scientific research and artistic creation. The third type consists of intellectual labourers who are subordinated to the power of capital. Many contemporary leftist scholars criticise Marx, claiming that he neglected the question of surplus-value production in the sphere of immaterial labour. For instance, Virno points out that, in Marx’s view, immaterial labour that does not provide a final product “cannot, to a great extent, be considered productive (surplus-value) labour. Marx actually accepted the equation: labour without a final product = personal private service.”[2]2 Virno, Paolo. *A Grammar of the Multitude: For an Analysis of Contemporary Forms of Life*. Los Angeles: Semiotext(e), 2004.66 In reality, this accusation is unfounded. Those familiar with the *Communist Manifesto* will clearly recall Marx and Engels’ penetrating diagnosis: “The bourgeoisie has stripped of its halo every occupation hitherto honoured and looked up to with reverent awe. It has converted the physician, the lawyer, the priest, the poet, the man of science, into its paid wage-labourers.”[11]11 Karl Marx and Frederick Engels, *Manifesto of the Communist Party*, in *Marx and Engels Collected Works*, Vol. 6, p. 487. Those who have carefully read *Capital* and its manuscripts will recall the analogy between the “sausage factory” and the “educational factory,”[12]12 Karl Marx, *Capital*, Vol. 1, Ch. 14, on the “educational factory” and the “sausage factory” as examples of productive labour under capital. and should remember the analyses Marx made of teachers, actors, artists, writers, painters, and so on: for their audience, they are not wage-labourers, but when a boss hires a teacher to make money, or an entrepreneur hires an actor or artist to enrich himself, then for the boss or entrepreneur who employs them, their immaterial labour is wage-labour that produces surplus-value, and they are productive workers in the modern sense.

当马克思恩格斯将视角从物质生产领域转移到非物质生产领域时,他们看到了智力的新的作用形式,即非物质劳动和精神生产问题。他们将这种生产分为三种类型:第一种是资产阶级及其代言人的智力劳动。每个时代占统治地位的思想都是统治阶级的思想,“因此在这个阶级内部,一部分人是作为该阶级的思想家出现的,他们是这一阶级的积极的、有概括能力的意识形态家,他们把编造这一阶级关于自身的幻想当做主要的谋生之道”[10]。这类非物质劳动者构成了统治阶级的代言人。第二类是自主从事精神生产的人。他们的智力还没有从属于资本逻辑。他们可以充分发挥自己的聪明才智和特长,自主从事科学研究和艺术创作等各种非物质生产活动。第三类是屈从于资本权力的智力劳动者。许多当代左翼学者都批评马克思,说他忽视了非物质劳动领域中的剩余价值生产问题,如维尔诺指出,在马克思看来,没有提供终端产品的非物质劳动,“在极大程度上就不能说生产性(剩余价值)劳动。马克思实际上接受了这样一个等式:没有终端产品的劳动=个人私人服务”[2]66。实际上,这种指责是没有根据的。熟稔《共产党宣言》的人应该会清楚地记得马克思恩格斯那充满睿智的诊断:“资产阶级抹去了一切向来受人尊崇和令人敬畏的职业的神圣光环。它把医生、律师、教士、诗人和学者变成了它出钱招募的雇佣劳动者”[11] 。熟读《资本论》及其手稿的人,应该记得“香肠工厂”和“教育工厂”的类比[12],应当记得马克思关于教师、演员、艺术家、作家、画家等所做的分析:对于他们的受众而言,他们并不是雇佣劳动者,但当老板雇佣教师来赚钱、企业主雇佣演员或艺术家来发财致富时,对于雇佣他们的老板或企业主而言,他们的非物质劳动就是一种生产剩余价值的雇佣劳动,他们也就是现代意义上的生产工人。

Third, what relationship do intellect and labour-power have with the working class? In Marx’s view, labour-power is the precondition for the establishment of the capitalist mode of production. So-called labour-power refers to the aggregate of physical and intellectual capacities expended in the labour process, and the working class refers mainly to modern wage-workers who live by selling their labour-power. Combining Marx and Engels’ analysis of the spheres of material and immaterial production, it can be seen that whether a person functions as physical labour-power or intellectual labour-power, as long as they create surplus-value for the capitalist, they constitute a component of what Marx and Engels called the modern wage-worker. This again demonstrates that the distinction between physical and intellectual labour is by no means an important criterion by which Marx and Engels demarcated the proletariat and the working class. The proportion of physical to intellectual labour only affects the concrete form of direct labour, but cannot overturn the overall logic of labour-power as the sum of physical and intellectual capacities. Whether physical labourers and mental labourers can become the proletariat in Marx and Engels’ sense depends not on their level of intellect, nor on how much knowledge they possess, but on their position within the relations of production. In class society, the distinction between physical and mental labour is, in essence, merely a subordinate factor within the logic of class. It is of significant importance in understanding the class composition of the proletariat and the working class: material producers who live by selling their physical labour-power constitute the physical-labour proletariat, while those mental labourers dominated by capital constitute, to a certain extent, a component of what Engels called the “mental-labour proletariat.”[13]13 Frederick Engels, “To the International Congress of Socialist Students,” in *Marx and Engels Collected Works*, Vol. 27, p. 487. [n] The Chinese term *shuli* (梳理) means “to sort out, to comb through, to organise systematically.” It is retained here in the original to indicate the author’s summary of the preceding analysis before proceeding to critique.487

第三,智力与劳动力、工人阶级存在何种关系?在马克思看来,劳动力是资本主义生产方式建立的前提。所谓劳动力是指在劳动过程中消耗的体力和智力的总和,而工人阶级主要是指靠出卖劳动力来维持生计的现代雇佣工人。结合马克思恩格斯关于物质生产和非物质生产领域的分析,可以看出,一个人不论是作为体力劳动力还是智力劳动力,只要为资本家创造剩余价值,他就构成了马克思恩格斯所说的现代雇佣工人的组成部分。这也再次表明,体力与智力之分决不是马克思恩格斯界划无产阶级和工人阶级的重要标准,体力与智力的比重只是影响直接劳动的具体形态,但并不能颠覆劳动力作为体力和智力之和的总体逻辑。体力劳动者和脑力劳动者能否成为马克思恩格斯意义上的无产阶级,并不具取决于他们的智力水平,也不取决于他们拥有多少知识,而是根源于他们在生产关系中所处的位置。在阶级社会中,体力劳动与脑力劳动之分在本质上只是从属于阶级逻辑的附属因素,它们在理解无产阶级和工人阶级的阶级构成时具有重要意义:靠出卖体力劳动力为主的物质生产者构成了体力劳动无产阶级,而那些受资本支配的脑力劳动者在一定程度上构成了恩格斯所说的“脑力劳动无产阶级”[13]487的组成部分。

With the above梳理 [n], we can now comment on the subject theories of contemporary Western leftists.

有了上述梳理,下面我们就来评论一下当代西方左翼的主体理论。

First, the distinction between material and immaterial labor is by no means the criterion for demarcating the proletariat from the multitude. Hardt and Negri, on the basis of the distinction between material and immaterial labor, define manual laborers engaged in the former as the proletariat in the Marx-Engels sense, while defining immaterial laborers engaged in biopolitical labor as the multitude, which is different from the traditional proletariat. In doing so, they have dug an unbridgeable chasm between the proletariat and the multitude, and this is itself illegitimate. The proletariat and productive workers in the Marx-Engels sense include not only some manual laborers but also some persons engaged in immaterial labor. With the transformation of the mode of production in contemporary capitalism, the proportion of mental labor and the intellectual proletariat has indeed risen day by day, but this is merely a change in the composition of the proletariat, not a question of the fading away of class logic itself. Therefore, when they declare, on the basis of biopolitics and immaterial labor, that Marx’s class logic and the theory of the working class are obsolete, they are clearly committing an empiricist error. In this respect, cognitive capitalism has a certain rationality: on the basis of the relationship between capital and cognitive labor, it has put forward the categories of cognitive worker and cognitive proletariat, and to a certain extent it has adhered to the Marxist class logic, which is worthy of affirmation. More importantly, even within immaterial labor, there are immaterial labors of different natures. Yet they set aside the analysis of relations of production and social relations and lump all immaterial laborers under the category of the multitude. In this way, they confuse the bourgeoisie and its spokespersons, some free immaterial laborers, and the “mental-labor proletariat” in the Marx-Engels sense, which is entirely an eclectic logic that transcends class.

首先,物质劳动与非物质劳动之分决不是界划无产阶级和诸众的标准。哈特、奈格里基于物质劳动和非物质劳动之分,将从事前者的体力劳动者界划为马克思恩格斯意义上的无产阶级,而将从事生命政治劳动的非物质劳动者界定为不同于传统无产阶级的诸众,进而在无产阶级和诸众之间挖了一条无法弥合的鸿沟,这本身就是非法的。马克思恩格斯意义上的无产阶级和生产工人不仅包含部分体力劳动者,也包括部分从事非物质劳动的人。随着当代资本主义生产方式的转型,脑力劳动和智力无产阶级的比重的确日益上升,但这只不过是无产阶级构成结构上的变化,而不是阶级逻辑本身的消退问题。因此,当他们基于生命政治和非物质劳动,宣告马克思的阶级逻辑和工人阶级理论过时时,显然犯了经验主义错误。在这方面,认知资本主义有一定的合理性,他们基于资本与认知劳动的关系,提出了认知工人和认知无产阶级范畴,在一定程度上坚持了马克思主义的阶级逻辑,是值得肯定的。更为重要的是,即便在非物质劳动的内部,也存在不同性质的非物质劳动,而他们却抛开生产关系和社会关系分析,将所有非物质劳动者统统纳入诸众的范畴之下,这样就把资产阶级及其代言人、部分自由的非物质劳动者和马克思恩格斯意义上的“脑力劳动无产阶级”混淆在一起了,完全是一种超阶级的折中逻辑。

Second, general intellect is by no means the criterion for distinguishing the working class from the multitude. Slightly different from Hardt and Negri, Virno understands general intellect as the “One” behind the multitude. In fact, this is also unreasonable. According to Virno’s definition, general intellect is no longer the general social intellect in Marx’s sense, but rather all the generic attributes possessed by each individual. By this logic, general intellect would have existed as early as primitive society, and then everyone would become the multitude in Virno’s sense, which is clearly illegitimate. As Marx said, as a generic attribute, intellect is by no means a characteristic of rank, still less a dominant criterion for dividing ranks and classes. In this regard, Virno’s approach of taking general intellect as the criterion, understanding the multitude as the possessors of general intellect, and using this to demarcate the difference between the traditional proletariat and the modern multitude, is itself problematic. On this point, the cognitive capitalism school has provided a more detailed theoretical analysis, dividing cognitive laborers into cognitive workers and the cognitive proletariat, and to a certain extent achieving a concrete analysis of the forms in which intellect functions. However, their shortcomings are also very obvious: they incorporate the first type of immaterial laborers in the Marx-Engels sense into the category of cognitive workers, blurring the boundary between the producers of bourgeois ideology and cognitive workers.

其次,一般智力也决不是区分工人阶级与诸众的标准。与哈特、奈格里略有不同,维尔诺将一般智力理解为诸众背后的“一”。实际上,这也是不合理的。按照维尔诺的界定,一般智力不再是马克思意义上的社会总体智力,而是每个个体所具有的一切类属性。照此逻辑,早在原始社会,一般智力就存在了,那么,所有人也就都成了维尔诺所说的诸众了,这显然是非法的。如马克思所说,作为类属性,智力决不是等级的特性,更不可能是划分等级和阶级的主导尺度。就此而言,维尔诺以一般智力为标准,将诸众理解为一般智力的拥有者,以此来界划传统无产阶级与现代诸众的差异,这一做法本身就是有问题的。在这一点上,认知资本主义流派做了更为细致的理论分析,将认知劳动者划分为认知工人和认知无产阶级,在一定程度上实现了对智力作用形式的具体分析。然而,他们的缺陷也非常明显:他们把马克思恩格斯意义上的第一种非物质劳动者纳入认知工人的范畴之中,模糊了资产阶级思想生产者和认知工人之间的界限。

Third, labor power and creativity are not a linearly opposed binary logic. To highlight the cognitive characteristics of contemporary capitalist labor, the cognitive capitalism school has created a new category, “creativity,” alongside the category of labor power, and treats the two as two different logical mechanisms: the former refers to manual labor power, the latter to intellectual creativity. On this basis, they distinguish two different logics of exploitation. To a certain extent, this helps to reveal the development and evolution of contemporary capitalism and its operating mechanisms. However, this linear binary division is itself based on a distortion of the connotation of labor power. Labor power is itself the sum of physical and mental power; so-called creativity is itself a part of labor power, not an external logic independent of labor power. On this point, Virno’s judgment is correct: “What does ‘labor power’ mean? Labor power means the potential for production. Potential, that is, aptitude, capacity, vitality… When we speak of labor power we implicitly refer to various capacities: linguistic capacity, memory, motility, etc.” [2]2 Virno, Paolo. *A Grammar of the Multitude: For an Analysis of Contemporary Forms of Life*. Los Angeles: Semiotext(e), 2004.104 The reason life is highlighted as the center of politics and power is, in the final analysis, that life is the carrier of labor power. “Wherever there is biopolitics, the dimension of potential inherent in human existence enters the forefront, enters immediate experience: not the words that have been spoken, but the capacity to speak itself; not labor that has actually been completed, but the general capacity for production. Only, and exclusively, under the name of labor power does the dimension of potential existence become evident.” [2]2 Virno, Paolo. *A Grammar of the Multitude: For an Analysis of Contemporary Forms of Life*. Los Angeles: Semiotext(e), 2004.108 The secret of biopoliticization lies in the economization of life. Virno’s judgment reveals the secret of biopolitics and is worthy of affirmation.

再次,劳动力与创造力并不是线性对立的二元逻辑。为了突出当代资本主义劳动的认知特性,认知资本主义流派在劳动力范畴之外重新创造了一个新的范畴即“创造力”,并将二者视为两种不同的逻辑机制:前者指代体力劳动力,后者指代智力创造力,并以此为基础,区分了两种不同的剥削逻辑。这在一定程度上有助于揭示当代资本主义的发展演变及其运行机制。不过,这种线性的二元划分本身就是建立在对劳动力内涵的曲解之上的,劳动力本身就是体力和智力的总和,所谓创造力本身就是劳动力的一部分,而不是独立于劳动力的外在逻辑。在这点上,维尔诺的判断是正确的:“‘劳动力’是什么意思?劳动力意味着生产的潜力。潜力,也就是天资、能力、活力……谈到劳动力我们就隐指了各种能力:语言能力、记忆力、能动性等。”[2]104生命之所以凸显为政治和权力的中心,归根结底在于生命是劳动力的载体,“凡是有生命政治存在的地方,就涉及人类存在的潜力维度进入最前沿,进入直接经验:不是说过的话,而是说话的能力本身;不是实际上已经完成的劳动,而是通用的生产能力。只有,也只能在劳动力的名义下,存在的潜力维度才会显而易见”[2]108。生命政治化的秘密在于生命的经济化。维尔诺的这一判断揭示了生命政治学的秘密所在,是值得肯定的。

IV. Engels’s Admonition: The Historical Mission of the Mental-Labor Proletariat

四、恩格斯的忠告:脑力劳动无产阶级的历史使命

In his 1893 letter to the International Congress of Socialist Students, Engels pointed out: “I hope your efforts will make the students increasingly aware that it is precisely from their ranks that a mental-labor proletariat should emerge, which is charged with the mission of playing a great role alongside its brothers, the manual-labor workers, shoulder to shoulder in the coming revolution. Past bourgeois revolutions demanded of the universities only lawyers, as the best raw material for training their political activists; but the emancipation of the working class requires, in addition, doctors, engineers, chemists, agronomists, and other specialists, for the problem is not only to manage the political machine but also to manage all social production, and what is needed here is not resounding phrases but rich knowledge.” [13]13 Frederick Engels, “To the International Congress of Socialist Students,” in *Marx and Engels Collected Works*, Vol. 27, p. 487. [n] The Chinese term *shuli* (梳理) means “to sort out, to comb through, to organise systematically.” It is retained here in the original to indicate the author’s summary of the preceding analysis before proceeding to critique.487 Although this letter is brief, the ideas it contains are very rich, and even when read today, it still possesses a contemporary value that cannot be ignored.

在1893年《致国际社会主义者大学生代表大会》的信中,恩格斯指出:“希望你们的努力将使大学生们愈益意识到,正是应该从他们的行列中产生出这样一种脑力劳动无产阶级,他们负有使命同自己从事体力劳动的工人兄弟在一个队伍里肩并肩地在即将来临的革命中发挥巨大作用。过去的资产阶级革命向大学要求的仅仅是律师,作为培养他们的政治活动家的最好的原料;而工人阶级的解放,除此之外还需要医生、工程师、化学家、农艺师及其他专门人材,因为问题在于不仅要掌管政治机器,而且要掌管全部社会生产,而在这里需要的决不是响亮的词句,而是丰富的知识。”[13]487这封信虽然简短,但它包含的思想却非常丰富,即便在今天读来,仍然具有不可忽视的当代价值。

First, what is the “mental-labor proletariat” that Engels speaks of? Above, starting from the theory of labor power, we elaborated the first connotation of the mental-labor proletariat, namely, those mental laborers who are dominated by capital and create surplus value (the third type of immaterial laborers mentioned above). But this is not the entire connotation of the “mental-labor proletariat”; besides this, it also contains another important dimension. Marx pointed out: “The utilitarian intellect that fights for its own home is certainly different from the free intellect that fights for the cause of justice regardless of its own home. The intellect that serves a specific purpose, a specific thing, is fundamentally different from the intellect that dominates all things and serves only itself.” [8]8 Karl Marx, “Debates on the Law on Theft of Wood,” *Marx and Engels Collected Works*, Vol. 1, pp. 338, 339, 343. (The original Chinese text cites these pages from the Chinese edition of the *Collected Works*.)339 As a generic attribute, “intellect is not the selfish interest that seeks satisfaction; it is the universal interest.” [8]8 Karl Marx, “Debates on the Law on Theft of Wood,” *Marx and Engels Collected Works*, Vol. 1, pp. 338, 339, 343. (The original Chinese text cites these pages from the Chinese edition of the *Collected Works*.)340 As mental laborers, whether their intellect serves the utilitarian interest of private gain or the universal intellect that tirelessly struggles for the cause of human justice is also an important criterion for demarcating the mental-labor proletariat. Under capitalist conditions, “because natural science is used by capital as a means of enrichment, science itself becomes a means of enrichment for those who develop it.” [6]6 Karl Marx, *Capital*, Vol. 1, in *Marx and Engels Collected Works*, Vol. 44, p. 301. The original Chinese citation is to a Chinese edition; the English edition reference is supplied for the reader.572 Among the second type of immaterial laborers, those intellectual laborers who engage in scientific research for the purpose of getting rich, because they have not cast off the fetters of private interest and utilitarianism, have not yet reached the level of the mental-labor proletariat of which Engels speaks; conversely, those intellectual laborers who tirelessly struggle for the cause of human emancipation also constitute an important component of the mental-labor proletariat.

首先,什么是恩格斯所说的“脑力劳动无产阶级”?上面我们从劳动力理论入手,阐述了脑力劳动无产阶级的第一层内涵,即那些受资本支配并创造剩余价值的脑力劳动者(上面提到的第三类非物质劳动者)。但这并不是“脑力劳动无产阶级”的全部内涵,除此之外,还包含另一个重要维度。马克思指出:“为自己的家园而奋斗的功利主义的智力,跟不顾自己的家园为正义事业而斗争的自由的智力当然是不同的。服务于某个特定目的、某种特定事物的智力同支配一切事物和只为自己服务的智力是有根本区别的。”[8]339作为类属性,“智力不是寻求满足的自私的利益,它是普遍的利益”[8]340。作为脑力劳动者,他们的智力究竟是服务于私人利益的功利主义智力,还是为人类正义事业而不懈奋斗的普遍智力,也是界划脑力劳动无产阶级的一个重要标准。在资本主义条件下,“由于自然科学被资本用作致富手段,从而科学本身也成为那些发展科学的人的致富手段”[6]572。在第二类非物质劳动者中,那些为了发财致富而从事科学研究的部分智力劳动者,由于没有摆脱私人利益和功利主义的羁绊,还无法达到恩格斯所说的脑力劳动无产阶级的层次;相反,那些为了人类解放事业而不懈奋斗的智力劳动者,也构成了脑力劳动无产阶级的重要组成部分。

Second, why does the proletarian revolution require a mental-labor proletariat? The era of the bourgeois revolution was an era that needed giants and produced them; their historical mission was to lay the foundation for the rule of the modern bourgeoisie. Similarly, the era of the proletarian revolution also needs its own giants, so as to lay the foundation for the liberation of the proletariat and humanity. Without the guidance of scientific theory, the success of the proletarian revolution would be impossible. The proletariat likewise needs its own political party, its own non-material laborers, its own producers of thought. More importantly, the proletariat also needs general intellect and knowledge; it needs to train its own doctors, engineers, chemists, and other specialized personnel, so as to provide a rich knowledge reserve and talent base for future state and social governance. In this regard, the proletarian revolution requires not only a manual-labor proletariat but also a mental-labor proletariat.

其次,无产阶级革命为什么需要脑力劳动无产阶级?资产阶级革命时代是一个需要巨人而且产生了巨人的时代,他们的历史使命是为现代资产阶级统治打下基础;同样,无产阶级革命时代也需要自己的巨人,从而为无产阶级和人类解放打下基础。没有科学理论作指导,就不可能有无产阶级革命的成功。无产阶级同样需要自己的政党,需要自己的非物质劳动者,需要自己的思想生产者。更为重要的是,无产阶级同样需要一般智力和知识,需要培养自己的医生、工程师、化学家和其他专门人才,为未来国家和社会治理等提供丰富的知识储备和人才基础。就此而言,无产阶级革命不仅需要体力劳动无产阶级,也需要脑力劳动无产阶级。

Third, what historical mission should the mental-labor proletariat undertake? The mental-labor proletariat must discard the utilitarian form of intellect, stand on the position of the proletariat, fight side by side with the manual-labor proletariat, and contribute its intellect to the liberation of humanity and the proletarian revolution. From this perspective, contemporary Western left-wing intellectuals have consistently maintained a critical stance toward capitalism, revealing the social contradictions of contemporary capitalism, and striving to provide new strategies for the liberation of the subject under new historical conditions. In this regard, their intellectual efforts are worthy of affirmation. However, they seem to have forgotten Engels’s admonition: the mental-labor proletariat should fight shoulder to shoulder with the manual-labor proletariat. Although both autonomism and cognitive capitalism acknowledge that the manual-labor proletariat remains an important component of the social structure of contemporary capitalism, in their identification of the subject of struggle they have cast the manual-labor proletariat aside, as if the liberation of the subject only requires relying on the multitude and cognitive workers. This is precisely what will not work. In today’s increasingly globalized world, without the leadership of a proletarian political party, without the guidance of scientific theory, without a unified class alliance, to rely solely on so-called autonomy of the multitude or the alliance of a minority of intellectual elites in an attempt to escape the compulsion of capitalist relations of production and state power is bound to be nothing more than a postmodernist fantasy. As Marx warned back then, in countries where the peasantry predominates, if the proletarian revolution cannot win the support of the peasants, it is doomed to become a solitary cry of lament; similarly, in countries where the manual-labor proletariat accounts for a relatively high proportion, if the struggles of the multitude and cognitive workers do not receive strong support from the manual proletariat, they are doomed to degenerate into a “storm in a teacup” or a “revolution in an ivory tower.”

再次,脑力劳动无产阶级应当担负何种历史使命?脑力劳动无产阶级要摒弃智力的功利主义形式,站在无产阶级立场之上,同体力劳动无产阶级一道并肩作战,为人类解放和无产阶级革命贡献自己的智力。从这个角度而言,当代西方左翼知识分子始终坚持对资本主义的批判立场,揭示当代资本主义的社会矛盾,力图为新的历史条件下的主体解放提供新的策略。就此而言,他们的智力努力是值得肯定的。不过,他们似乎遗忘了恩格斯的忠告:脑力劳动无产阶级应当同体力劳动无产阶级并肩战斗。虽然自治主义和认知资本主义都承认体力劳动无产阶级仍是当代资本主义社会结构的重要组成部分,但在斗争主体的认证上都把体力劳动无产阶级抛掷脑后,似乎主体解放只需要依靠诸众和认知工人就行了,这恰恰是行不通的。在全球化日益发展的今天,若没有无产阶级政党的领导,没有科学理论的指导,没有统一的阶级联盟,单纯依靠所谓的诸众自治或少数知识精英的联合,就妄图逃脱资本主义生产关系和国家权力的强制,注定只能是一种后现代主义的奇思幻想。就像马克思当年告诫的那样,在农民占据主导的国家中,如果无产阶级革命不能得到农民的支持,注定会成为一种孤鸿哀鸣;同样,在体力劳动无产阶级占据较高比重的国家中,如果诸众和认知工人的斗争得不到体力无产阶级的大力支持,注定会沦为一种“茶杯里的风暴”或“象牙塔里的革命”。

Finally, what kind of intellectual laborers does socialism need? Socialism also needs “doctors, engineers, chemists, agronomists and other specialized personnel”; it needs educators, thinkers, scientists, and artists, and so on. But what we need are intellectual laborers who can firmly stand on the people’s position and dedicate their wisdom to socialist modernization, not those refined egoists who use intellect to seek private gain; what we need are intellectual laborers who take the common interest as their own responsibility, not utilitarian intellectual laborers centered on private interests.

最后,社会主义需要什么样的智力劳动者?社会主义也需要“医生、工程师、化学家、农艺师及其他专门人材”,需要教育家、思想家、科学家和艺术家,等等。但我们所需要的是能够站稳人民立场、为社会主义现代化建设奉献智慧的智力劳动者,而不是那些以智力来谋取私利的精致的利己主义者;我们所需要的是以普遍利益为己任的智力劳动者,而不是以私人利益为中心的功利主义的智力劳动者。

References

参考文献

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[1]Michael Hardt,Antonio Negri.Multitude[M].New York:The Penguin Press,2004:109.

[2]2 Virno, Paolo. *A Grammar of the Multitude: For an Analysis of Contemporary Forms of Life*. Los Angeles: Semiotext(e), 2004. [Italy] Paolo Virno. *A Grammar of the Multitude* [M]. Trans. Dong Bicheng. Beijing: The Commercial Press, 2017.

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[3]3 Marx, Karl. *Grundrisse: Foundations of the Critique of Political Economy*. Translated by Martin Nicolaus. London: Penguin Books, 1973, p. 706. Marx, Engels. *Complete Works of Marx and Engels* (Vol. 31) [M]. Beijing: People’s Publishing House, 1998: 102.

[3]马克思,恩格斯.马克思恩格斯全集(第31卷)[M].北京:人民出版社,1998:102.

[4]4 The “Fragment on Machines” refers to a section of Marx’s *Grundrisse* (1857–1858) in which he discusses the role of general intellect (general social knowledge) in the development of productive forces and the potential for the collapse of capitalism. Yann Moulier-Boutang. *Cognitive Capitalism* [M]. Cambridge: Polity Press, 2012.

[4]Yann Moulier-Boutang.Cognitive Capitalism[M].Cambridge:Polity Press,2012.

[5]5 “Biopolitics” (生命政治) refers to a concept developed by Michel Foucault, later taken up by Italian autonomist thinkers like Antonio Negri and Paolo Virno, denoting a form of power that manages and regulates life, populations, and biological processes, as opposed to the sovereign power over death. In this context, its “return” signifies a political strategy centered on the self-organization of living labor and the common. Carlo Vercellone. “From Formal Subsumption to General Intellect: Elements for a Marxist Reading of the Thesis of Cognitive Capitalism” [J]. *Historical Materialism*, 2007 (1).

[5]Carlo Vercellone.From Formal Subsumption to General Intellect:Elements for a Marxist Reading of the Thesis of Cognitive Capitalism[J].Historical Materialism,2007(1).

[6]6 Karl Marx, *Capital*, Vol. 1, in *Marx and Engels Collected Works*, Vol. 44, p. 301. The original Chinese citation is to a Chinese edition; the English edition reference is supplied for the reader. Marx, Engels. *Complete Works of Marx and Engels* (Vol. 47) [M]. Beijing: People’s Publishing House, 1979.

[6]马克思,恩格斯.马克思恩格斯全集(第47卷)[M].北京:人民出版社,1979.

[7]7 Paolo Virno, *A Grammar of the Multitude*, p. 87. The original Chinese citation is to a Chinese edition; the English edition reference is supplied for the reader. Michael Hardt, Antonio Negri. *Commonwealth* [M]. Cambridge/Massachusetts: The Belknap Press of Harvard University Press, 2009: 140.

[7]Michael Hardt,Antonio Negri.Commonwealth[M].Cambridge/Massachusetts:The Belknap Press of Harvard University Press,2009:140.

[8]8 Karl Marx, “Debates on the Law on Theft of Wood,” *Marx and Engels Collected Works*, Vol. 1, pp. 338, 339, 343. (The original Chinese text cites these pages from the Chinese edition of the *Collected Works*.) Marx, Engels. *Complete Works of Marx and Engels* (Vol. 40) [M]. Beijing: People’s Publishing House, 1982.

[8]马克思,恩格斯.马克思恩格斯全集(第40卷)[M].北京:人民出版社,1982.

[9]9 Karl Marx, *Capital*, Vol. 1, and the *Grundrisse*. Sun Leqiang. “The Problem of ‘General Intellect’ in the Context of Marx’s ‘Fragment on Machines’” [J]. *Journal of East China Normal University*, 2018 (4).

[9]孙乐强.马克思“机器论片断”语境中的“一般智力”问题[J].华东师范大学学报,2018(4).

[10]10 Karl Marx and Frederick Engels, *The German Ideology*, in *Marx and Engels Collected Works*, Vol. 5, p. 59. Marx, Engels. *Collected Works of Marx and Engels* (Vol. 1) [M]. Beijing: People’s Publishing House, 2009: 551.

[10] 马克思,恩格斯.马克思恩格斯文集(第1卷)[M].北京:人民出版社,2009:551.

[11]11 Karl Marx and Frederick Engels, *Manifesto of the Communist Party*, in *Marx and Engels Collected Works*, Vol. 6, p. 487. Marx, Engels. *Selected Works of Marx and Engels* (Vol. 1) [M]. Beijing: People’s Publishing House, 2012: 403.

[11] 马克思,恩格斯.马克思恩格斯选集(第1卷)[M].北京:人民出版社,2012:403.

[12]12 Karl Marx, *Capital*, Vol. 1, Ch. 14, on the “educational factory” and the “sausage factory” as examples of productive labour under capital. Marx, Engels. *Complete Works of Marx and Engels* (Vol. 44) [M]. Beijing: People’s Publishing House, 2001: 582.

[12] 马克思,恩格斯.马克思恩格斯全集(第44卷)[M].北京:人民出版社,2001:582.

[13]13 Frederick Engels, “To the International Congress of Socialist Students,” in *Marx and Engels Collected Works*, Vol. 27, p. 487. [n] The Chinese term *shuli* (梳理) means “to sort out, to comb through, to organise systematically.” It is retained here in the original to indicate the author’s summary of the preceding analysis before proceeding to critique. Marx, Engels. *Complete Works of Marx and Engels* (Vol. 22) [M]. Beijing: People’s Publishing House, 1965.

[13] 马克思,恩格斯.马克思恩格斯全集(第22卷)[M].北京:人民出版社,1965.

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