ABSTRACT
In Intellectual and Manual Labour, Alfred Sohn-Rethel discusses commodity fetishism and the relationship between philosophy and money circulation. On a similar trajectory to Granberg, George Tsogas has suggested that ‘Sohn-Rethel’s thought finds new relevance nowadays, under the prevalence of a cognitive capitalism’. Cognitive capitalism is part of the neo-liberal assault on workers as well as a response to the failures of post-Fordist reorganisation of the assembly line. Sohn-Rethel worked as research assistant for a major interest group of German big business, the Mitteleuropaischer Wirtschaftstag. This position allowed him to study the highest echelons of German capitalism between 1931–1936, especially the finance branch. Concomitant with the emergence of the self, capitalism was also entrenching the duality between public and private spheres of activity inherited from earlier modes of production. The public domain excels in providing opportunities for role play and identity formation.
