Theories Of Exploitation In The 19th Century

Exploitation has been a major issue in many different workplaces such as the manufacturing industries and this essay highlights the importance of Karl’s Marx’s theory on exploitation in the nineteenth century. This essay will define and discuss the concept of alienation with a view of whether it still exists. It will explore if there is still class struggle in todays world in terms of working class and the upper class. The essay will also examine if exploitation is still around in today’s society and whether people still have to go to work in order to make a living and if it is still relevant at work. Finally a discussion of where exploitation applies in Britain and china will be included with some backed up evidence. A conclusion to sum up
Lauren Langman and Devorah Kalekin-Fishma stated that McDonalds contains two forms of alienation, the first being “real deskilling” which is mainly where humans are trained to act like machines and this is called “disembodiment” (Langman. L, and Kalekin-Fishma. D, 2006). The second is “alienation from self”, this is where an employee believes that they are doing nothing more than a machine could do and these both relate to McDonalds because workers are trained to operate tills and cook food accordingly and cannot use their full skills. Capitalism alienates workers at McDonalds from the products of their labour because they do not get to keep the product and it belongs to capitalists, which sell them on for a profit. In terms of alienation, every employee experiences it at one point in their working life as using their labour to produce a product to be sold off to a market will always
Workers expressed that “During work, some employees were forbidden to speak to each other and some were forced to stand for hours without a break” (The Guardian, 2011); this is a sign of extreme exploitation in China and a worldwide company like apple so workers felt unworthy of and were alienated from others. Adidas also exploit workers in china, Adidas send over the material to Chinese factory workers to manufacture the product because labour is cheaper, labour law is not that strict and people are desperate for jobs. Factory workers in china were ‘forced to lie’ during an Adidas safety inspection (Independent, 2012) and this was because the working conditions they worked in had to be covered up. Such factories like the two examples above exploit workers and alienate them from other. Workers in china are paid below the minimum wage to produce a shoe that can be sold for over 80 pounds in the UK when at the end they cannot afford to buy the shoe therefore a large amount of surplus value being taken from