From “Estranged Labor” to “World Alienation” — Arendt’s Inheritance and Misreading of Marx’s Thought

Hannah Arendt was one of the most important political philosophers of the 20th century. Her outstanding contribution lies in analyzing the existential conditions of modern people and criticizing the deprivation of human rights by Western totalitarian governments. In *The Human Condition*, she refers to the phenomenon of “modern man creating a world alienated from himself” as “world alienation.” There is some controversy in academic circles regarding the relationship between Arendt’s thought and Marx’s thought, but Marx’s influence on Arendt is beyond doubt. She once conducted research on Marx from a political-philosophical perspective and offered him high praise. Similarly, Marx’s theory of alienation had a profound impact on Arendt. This is mainly reflected in three aspects: the general approach to discussing the problem of alienation, the theoretical premise for understanding the phenomenon of alienation, and the ultimate point of the theory of alienation.

汉娜·阿伦特是20世纪重要的政治哲学家之一，她的杰出贡献在于分析现代人的生存现状，批判西方极权主义政府对人权的剥夺。在《人的境况》一书中，她将“现代人制造出一个与自己相疏离的世界”这一现象称为“世界异化”。学界对于阿伦特思想与马克思思想的关系存在一定的争议，但马克思对阿伦特的影响是毋庸置疑的，她曾对马克思开展过政治哲学向度的研究，并给予马克思以高度的赞美。同样，马克思的异化思想对阿伦特也产生深远的影响。这主要体现在三个方面——讨论异化问题的总体思路、理解异化现象的理论前提，以及异化思想的落脚点。

First, Arendt believed that the revolutionary character of Marx’s thought lies in his “resistance to and subversion of tradition, freeing himself from thinking that remains stuck in the priority of theoretical interpretation and stepping into historical and political activity.” When discussing the problem of alienation, like Marx, she no longer followed the Western tradition of speculative philosophy, which understands alienation as an inescapable fate of the human world and the objective world, or as a universal and eternal objective law. Instead, she treated alienation as a concrete historical condition in which human subjectivity is lost, and inherited Marx’s general approach to discussing the problem of alienation: that is, first explaining the state in which human beings realize their subjectivity; alienation is a departure from this state; overcoming and sublating alienation means realizing the restoration of human subjectivity.

第一，阿伦特认为马克思思想的革命性体现在他“反抗、颠覆传统，从停留在优先理论阐释的思考中解脱出来，迈入了历史的、政治的活动之中”。在讨论异化问题时，她像马克思一样，不再遵循西方思辨哲学传统将异化理解为人类世界与客观世界无可逃避的命运或普遍性、永恒性的客观规律。反之，她将异化当作具体历史时期中人主体性丧失的现实状况，并继承了马克思讨论异化问题的总体思路，即预先说明人使自己的主体性得以实现的状态，异化是对这一状态的背离，克服、扬弃异化即实现人主体性的复归。

Second, the explanation of the generation and realization of human subjectivity is the theoretical premise for understanding the phenomenon of alienation. Marx examined the characteristics of human species-being within the concrete practice of human beings, pointing out that the essential difference between humans and animals lies in humans’ ability to engage in free, conscious productive activity, i.e., labor. In labor, on the one hand, humans take nature as the means of subsistence for maintaining their survival and as the object and tool of their conscious life activity; on the other hand, nature appears as the work of humans and their reality, and humans intuit themselves in the world they create. Therefore, human labor is an activity of creating the world and self-realization, an activity that generates and realizes human subjectivity. Arendt inherited Marx’s method of explaining human beings within their actual activities, transcending the Western philosophical tradition that externalizes and abstracts human essence. She held that “man is a conditioned being, because anything that comes into contact with him immediately becomes a condition of his further existence. … In addition to the conditions given to human life on earth, humans also often create their own, artificial conditions beyond them.” Human subjectivity is generated and realized in humans’ own actual, concrete activities.

第二，关于人的主体性生成和实现的阐释是理解异化现象的理论前提。马克思将人的类本质特性置于人具体的实践中予以考察，指出人与动物的本质区别就在于人能够开展自由、有意识的生产活动，即劳动。人在劳动时，一方面把自然界作为维持他生存的生活资料和他有意识的生命活动的对象和工具；另一方面，自然界表现为人的作品和现实，人在他创造的世界中直观自身。因此人的劳动是创造世界、自我实现的活动，是生成、实现人主体性的活动。阿伦特继承了马克思将人置于现实的活动中进行阐释的方法，超越了把人的本质外在化、抽象化的西方哲学传统，认为“人是被条件规定的存在者，因为任何东西一经他们接触，就立刻变成了他们下一步存在的条件。……除了人在地球上的生活被给定的那些条件外，人也常常在它们之外，创造出他们自己的、人为的条件”，人的主体性是在自身现实的、具体的活动中生成和实现的。

Third, the theory of alienation is grounded in the critique of real capitalist society. Marx explained estranged labor as follows: under the conditions of capitalist private ownership, the capitalist owns the means of production, and the worker can only engage in specific labor under given conditions, confined to a fixed field of production. Labor becomes a forced, alien activity for the worker. The product of labor, as the result of labor activity, also becomes an existence opposed to the worker. “The more wealth the worker produces, the greater the influence and scale of his production, the poorer he becomes. The more commodities the worker creates, the cheaper a commodity he becomes. The increase in the value of the world of things is directly proportional to the devaluation of the world of men.” Therefore, labor is degraded from an activity that manifests the essential power of humans into a mere means for maintaining physical survival, and the relationship between humans is replaced by the relationship between things. In essence, Marx’s theory of alienation is a critique of the capitalist social system. Correspondingly, the “world alienation” described by Arendt is the phenomenon in which modern people produce a public world for interaction with others but are forced to distance themselves from it, thereby falling into an isolated, atomized state. This is because industrial society exploits the peasant and working classes, seizing their property: on the one hand, it deprives them of the qualification to actively participate in political activities; on the other hand, it occupies their leisure time, forcing the proletariat to engage in heavy productive labor for survival, reducing them to slaves producing for the capitalist. Thus, Arendt, to a certain extent, inherited Marx’s critique of capitalist society.

第三，落脚在对现实资本主义社会批判的异化思想。马克思这样阐释劳动异化：在资本主义私有制条件下，资本家占有生产资料，工人只能在给定的条件下从事特定的劳动，被禁锢在某个固定的生产领域，劳动成为对工人来说强制的、异己的活动。劳动产品作为劳动活动的成果，也成为同工人对立的存在，“工人生产的财富越多，他的生产的影响和规模越大，他就越贫穷。工人创造的商品越多，他就越变成廉价的商品。物的世界的增值同人的世界的贬值成正比”。因此，劳动从体现人的本质力量的活动被贬低成只为维持肉体生存的手段，人与人之间的关系被物与物之间的关系所取代。本质上说，马克思的异化思想是对资本主义社会制度的批判。与之相应，阿伦特描述的“世界异化”是现代人生产出供自己与他人交往的公共世界，却不得不远离它，从而使自己处于一种孤立的原子化状态。这是因为工业社会对农民和工人阶级的剥削，占有人民的财产，一方面是剥夺他们主动参与政治活动的资格，另一方面是霸占他们的闲暇时间，使无产者为了生存而从事繁重的生产活动，沦为为资本家生产的奴隶。由此可见，阿伦特在一定程度上继承了马克思对资本主义社会批判的思想。

Arendt once pointed out that “Marx lived in an era of great upheaval, and his greatness lies in pointing out and grasping the core of the change.” She opposed making Marx’s thought “overly authoritative” and turning it into “something formulaic,” arguing that Marx’s thought and theory should be developed and innovated in accordance with the changes in the themes of the times. Arendt and Marx lived in different stages of the development of Western capitalist society. She focused on the principal contradictions of her own era, made a diagnosis of the domain in which the phenomenon of alienation arises that differs from Marx’s, and prescribed different remedies for how to sublate and overcome alienation.

阿伦特曾指出“马克思生活在一个大变动的时代，他的伟大在于指出并把握了变化中的核心”，她反对将马克思的思想“过分权威化”和使之“成为公式化的东西”，而应当根据时代主题的变化对马克思的思想、理论进行发展和创新。阿伦特与马克思生活在西方资本主义社会发展的不同阶段，她关注到自己时代的主要矛盾，对异化现象产生的领域作出了与马克思不同的诊断，对如何扬弃、克服异化开出了不同的药方。

Marx’s research on the problem of alienation was embedded in his critique of bourgeois political economy. Political economists conceal the alienation of the essence of labor by not examining the direct relationship between the worker and the product of labor, thereby justifying the exploitation of workers by the bourgeoisie. The root of alienation lies in the material mode of production in the real world. With the prosperity of capitalist society, the phenomenon of alienation spreads from the economic sphere to the political and spiritual spheres of life. Only by overthrowing the relations of production and intercourse of capitalist society and abolishing private ownership of the means of production can all logic of alienation be sublated at its source, achieving the restoration of human subjectivity. Marx regarded the problem of alienation as a problem rooted in the economic sphere because, in the 19th century, the contradictions and conflicts between capitalists and workers continuously escalated and deepened. The proletariat resisted the oppression and exploitation of capitalists through various forms of struggle. The phenomenon of alienation, as an intense manifestation of the principal contradictions and crises of the society of that time, was closely related to the economic sphere that shapes the relations of production. Marx, having witnessed a large number of real social problems, became aware of the influence of material interests on the entire society, thus focusing on and excavating the economic roots behind various events and phenomena. Arendt’s theory of alienation describes the impoverishment of people’s economic life to illustrate the decline of their political life. She believed that human alienation is alienation in the political dimension, and that sublating alienation requires rebuilding the public sphere to realize the restoration of human capacity for political action. This is because the outbreak of the Second World War in the first half of the 20th century made the principal contradictions of the society of that time manifest in the political sphere. Political issues objectively triggered changes and developments in the global economy, science and technology, and ideology. At the same time, Arendt, due to her Jewish identity, suffered political persecution by the Nazi government, making her particularly sensitive to the political factors behind real problems.

马克思关于异化问题的研究嵌入了对资本主义国民经济学的批判。国民经济学家以不考察工人同劳动产品的直接关系来掩盖劳动本质的异化，并以此为资产阶级剥削工人的合理性作辩护。异化的根源是现实世界的物质生产方式，随着资本主义社会的繁荣，异化现象从经济领域扩散到政治生活领域和精神生活领域。只有推翻资本主义社会的生产关系和交往关系、消灭生产资料私有制，才能从源头上扬弃一切异化逻辑，实现人的主体性的复归。马克思把异化问题看作一个扎根于经济领域的问题，这是因为在19世纪，资本家和工人间的矛盾冲突不断升级和加深，无产阶级通过各种形式的斗争反抗资本家的压迫与剥削，异化现象作为当时社会主要矛盾和危机的激烈表现，与形成生产关系的经济领域紧密相关。马克思因见证了大量社会现实问题而意识到了物质利益对整个社会的影响力，从而关注并挖掘各类事件、现象背后的经济学根源。阿伦特的异化思想是通过描述人经济生活的贫困来说明人政治生活的凋敝，她认为人的异化是政治向度的异化，扬弃异化要通过重建公共空间以实现人政治行动能力的复归。这是因为20世纪上半叶爆发的第二次世界大战使当时社会的主要矛盾体现在政治领域，政治问题在客观上引发了全球经济、科技和意识形态领域的变化、发展。与此同时，阿伦特因其犹太人身份曾遭遇纳粹政府的政治迫害，使她对现实问题背后的政治因素尤为敏感。

However, we should note that, on the one hand, Arendt’s elaboration of Marx’s thought on alienation is more a matter of using Marx’s thought for her own theoretical construction, rather than developing the thought on alienation from the standpoint, viewpoint, and method of Marxism, thereby to a certain extent misreading Marx’s thought on the alienation of labor. On the other hand, while Arendt indeed grasped the theme of the changing times, her thought also has certain limitations and narrowness. In explaining the activities that create conditions for human existence, she understands labor as an activity constrained by the necessity of life, aimed at maintaining the organism’s metabolism; she understands action as an activity in which people freely and actively manifest their unique identity through political organization; and she understands work as an activity that produces a public world and provides a real basis for people’s capacity for action. Arendt’s belittling of labor is intended to highlight the importance of people’s capacity for political action, but to a certain extent it is also a misreading of Marx’s concept of labor, and it narrowly confines the generation and realization of human subjectivity to political activity, lacking the comprehensiveness and depth of Marx’s understanding of human activity. In addition, Arendt lacks the perspective that Marx possesses for interpreting the generation and loss of human subjectivity from a historical dimension. Marx believed that, in the historical process of the development of human productive forces, human capacities are expanded overall, and human needs are constantly generated and satisfied; therefore, human subjectivity is historically generated and realized through labor. He acknowledged the positive role that capitalist society plays in the generation of human subjectivity, and alienation, as a moment of the loss of human subjectivity, is temporary and will ultimately be sublated with the disappearance of private property. But before that, with changes in the forms of capital, alienation may also manifest in various new forms. However, Arendt’s claim that “the hallmark of modernity is world alienation, not the self-alienation that Marx envisioned” clearly lacks the depth and breadth of historical analysis of the problem of alienation.

然而，我们应该注意的是，一方面，阿伦特对马克思异化思想的阐发，更多地是借马克思的思想进行自身的理论建构，而并未站在马克思主义的立场、观点和方法上发展异化思想，从而在一定程度上误读了马克思的劳动异化思想。另一方面，阿伦特固然抓住了时代变化的主题，但其思想也存在一定的局限性和狭隘性。在说明为人的存在创造条件的活动时，她将劳动理解为受生命必然性制约、以维持机体的新陈代谢的活动；将行动理解为人通过政治组织自由、主动地彰显自己独特身份的活动；将工作理解为生产出公共世界、为人行动能力提供现实基础的活动。阿伦特对劳动的贬低是为了突出人政治行动能力的重要性，但在一定程度上亦是对马克思劳动概念的误读，并狭隘地将人主体性的生成和实现限定在政治活动中，缺乏马克思对人活动理解的全面性和深刻性。除此之外，阿伦特缺乏马克思那种从历史维度出发对人主体性生成和丧失进行诠释的视域。马克思认为，在人类生产力发展的历史过程中，人的能力在总体上得到扩展，人的需求也在不断产生、不断获得满足，因此，人的主体性是通过劳动历史地生成、实现的。他承认资本主义社会对人主体性生成起到的积极作用，异化作为人主体性丧失的环节是暂时的，终将随私有制的消亡而被扬弃。但在这之前，随着资本存在形式的变化，异化也可能呈现各种新的样态。但阿伦特提出“现代的标志是世界异化，而非马克思所设想的自我异化”，显然前者缺乏对异化问题进行历史分析的深度和广度。

Online editor: Paul

网络编辑：保罗