ABSTRACT
Why even bother with the classics? Why not abandon the cult of ancestors? It is because still today they help us frame global interconnections and their implications. Emile Durkheim believed that the complex division of labour attaches individuals to each other, since it creates mutual dependence for the products of the other. He deplored that individuals tied together by a complex division of labour neither realize just how great is their interdependence nor develop corresponding forms of collective consciousness and feeling. Mutual respect, gratitude and love are called for, but do not materialize. Simmel stressed that monetary chains span the globe, bringing consumers of products in touch with salespersons and distant producers of their choice. He stressed that these chains do not translate into a shared awareness of mutual dependence. Fond of exploring ambivalence, Simmel argued that modern money, while giving release from semi-feudal obligations, constitutes individuals free to choose their engagements and circles of social affiliation to their liking. At the same time the impersonality of modern money inserts an isolation layer between individuals and groups, keeping them together and yet apart in their money-sustained indifference to each other.
