Page 22 - Culture Society and Economy

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BRINGING THE ECONOMY BACK IN

culture, especially as purveyed by the mass media, is an unrelenting
focus on the individual personality, either in the form of exhibitionism
or, more frequently presented simply as a perfectly natural and unself-
conscious, even casual, self-centeredness. At the same time, Western intel-
lectuals assert that the self is more important than ever. However, this is
a classic case of presenting the surface of life as the reality. For this view
fails to grasp precisely what needs to be understood if the basis of modern
individualism is to be grasped in its distinctiveness.
The most striking feature of the modern world is the extension of
sociality as the foundation for individuality. There has been and will
continue to be an acceleration of the global division of labor which is the
entire basis of the acceleration of global markets. This division of labor
on this gigantic scale means, in effect, that the individual producer and
consumer are more dependent than ever on other producers and con-
sumers in distant places. This is by no means an original point for it was
first made by Hegel in his critique of Adam Smith more than 190 years
ago. Writing about the emergence of civil society and its peculiarities,
Hegel stated:

In the course of the actual establishment of selfish ends – an attainment
conditioned in this way by universality – there is formed a system of com-
plete interdependence, wherein the livelihood, happiness, and legal status
of one man is interwoven with the livelihood, happiness and rights of all. On
this system, individual happiness, & c., depend, and only in this connected
system are they actualized and secured. 5

There is abroad in the modern world enormously powerful economic
forces driving and restructuring the international division of labor on an
immensely global scale. This interdependent system of global finance,
production, distribution and exchange represents, when looked at as a
whole, a complex and contradictory system of sociality. In fact, the range
and peculiarity of one’s pattern of consumption at the individual level are
only possible because of this unprecedented sociality. It is this global
division of labor which creates and presents this cornucopia to consumers
all over the world. But the crux of the matter is not consumerism. As
Marx argued, consumption provides ‘the finishing touch’ to production. 6
The object of production is consumption. Consumption is an essential
part of the production process. The global producer consumes globally in
order to produce globally. It is the unprecedented global demand which
presents challenges to the producer and stimulates hitherto unheard-of
creativity and innovation by individuals and enterprises in their capacity
as producers. This is so whether the producers are working in a small

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