Moral and Social Problems, Essay Example

Marx’s Theory of Alienation and the Crises in Higher Education

In the 2005 essay entitled “The Rise of Contingent Work,” author Gary Zabel addresses the issue of how the social contract underpinning the relationship between capital and labor has been undermined in recent decades. The “standard work” model that allowed for a relatively amicable and often mutually beneficial balance between the interests of each side has been supplanted by “contingent work,” wherein labor has given up or had taken away many of the  protections and benefits it gained and held in the decades following World War II. Concurrent with these changes in the work force, many of the forces that have historically shaped the role of higher education in the United States have also been supplanted by forces that have birthed a surplus of educated labor. As employment conditions that once benefited workers continue to evaporate, and college graduates finding themselves mired in debt, it is possible, and perhaps even helpful to examine the current circumstances through the lens of Marx’s theory of alienation.

Taking the long view of history shows that the “postwar compromise” (Zabel, np, 2005) in the United States and Europe, wherein employers accepted unionized workforces in exchange for labor stability and strong returns on capital investment, was largely anomalous. The decline of profits that began in the 1970s, and which triggered the unraveling of the postwar compromise, also heralded a return to an employer/worker relationship more in keeping with history. Authors such as Zabel and Harry Brill note, however, that it also ushered in a new era for higher education, one in which attending college or university was no longer the exclusive province of the elite. The embrace of higher education by the masses has long been underpinned by the message that college degrees translate to higher salaries, and that a so-called “knowledge-based society” (Brill, p1, 1999) creates opportunities, and even demands, for well-educated workers. It is, however, becoming increasingly clear that this message is little more than propaganda supporting the motives and interests of employers.

Marx describes the concept of “alienation” as the end result of a system that objectifies labor, and which separates individuals from the fruits of their labor. In this framework, it is not just labor that becomes commoditized; laborers themselves become little more than commodities, cogs in the mechanistic system of capitalism. As the advances of the postwar compromise between employers and workers have been inexorably dismantled, the advent of “contingent work” (Zabel, np, 2005) has grown accordingly. Such contingent work is manifested in a variety of forms; in short, it is comprised of the myriad ways in which employer/worker relationships have diverged from the “standard work” (Zaebl, np, 2005) relationships that characterized the first few decades after WWII. While countless millions of students and college graduates have been assured that seeking higher education is the best –or even the only- route to financial security, the truth is that both the state and the private sector have promoted higher education primarily to assure the existence of a surplus of well-educated and relatively powerless workers.

A 2012 article in the New York Times informs readers that the U.S. had approximately $1 trillion in outstanding student loans, a figure the authors described as “crippling” (Martin & Lehren, np, 2012). This crippling debt has the effect of virtually enslaving graduates to the task of paying off their student loans; coupled with the dear of jobs and the competition for the few that are available al but ensures that a great number of graduates will find it difficult or even impossible to generate a significant return on their educational investments. Such economic realities make it all too easy to discuss the circumstances these students face by assessing them in the context of Marx’s theory of alienation. To the degree that Marx viewed the wage labor system as one that ensnares workers in what amounts to slavery, the current crises in higher education (to wit: surplus of graduates coupled with a collective and ruinous mountain of debt) has the practical effect of casting an ever-widening net in which workers are dragged into this system.

If Marx viewed the separation of man from the fruits of his labor as the firs form of alienation, then this effect is only magnified in the context of the higher education crises. The purpose for which many students are attending college or other post-secondary schools is simply to gain entry into the capitalist system. As such, the degrees or certifications being sought are themselves objectified, as they are being sought largely to be handed over to employers. The next form of alienation, in which workers are alienated from the process of working, is similarly reflected in the educational process to the extent that such processes are undertaken not for their inherent qualities, but solely as a means of buying into (or, perhaps more accurately, selling into) the capitalist system. Students are then alienated from themselves, as the perceived benefits of acquiring an education are defined almost entirely by how they benefit the system, and not the students themselves. Students who endeavor to seek degrees only to finds themselves mired in debt and unemployed are further alienated from the system they worked so hard to enter, a final humiliation in a long series of  humiliating and alienating exercise and circumstances.

While the collapse of the postwar compromise had the effect of making higher education more easily accessible for many people, it also had the effect of fundamentally transforming the very nature of higher education. What had once been the sole province of the elite has become, for many millions of students and graduates, simply a mechanism that prepares potential workers to be of service to the capitalist system. This has had the effect not just of ensuring a steady supply, and even a surplus of, educated workers; it has also redefined the very nature of what it means to be a student. Viewed through the lens of Marx’s theory of alienation, the staggering collective amount of outstanding student loans and the equally staggering surplus of educated workers combine to maintain a system wherein students are not just beholden to the capitalist system, but are quite literally paying for the right to remain so.

Works cited

Brill, Harry. “False promises of higher education: More graduates, fewer jobs.” Against the Current, 35. (1999): 34–39. Print.

Mandel, Ernest. “The causes of alienation.” International Socialist Review, 31. 3 (1970): Print.

Martin, Andrew and Andrew Lehren. “Degrees of Debt: A Generation Hobbled by the Soaring Cost of College.” Nytimes.com, 2014. Web. 9 Mar 2014. <http://www.nytimes.com/2012/05/13/business/student-loans-weighing-down-a-generation-with-heavy-debt.html?_r=2&pagewanted=all&>.

Marx, K. “Estranged Labour, Marx, 1844.” Marxists.org, 2014. Web. 9 Mar 2014. <http://www.marxists.org/archive/marx/works/1844/manuscripts/labour.htm>.

Zabel, Gary. “Hidden Connections: Higher Education and the Expansion of Contingent Work in the United States.” la Question sociale, (2006): Print.