Single Idea 21831

[catalogued under 24. Political Theory / D. Ideologies / 9. Communism]

Full Idea

What Marx called 'alienation' is the widespread condition of not being able to discover what one wants, or not being remotely positioned to achieve.

Gist of Idea

Alienation is not finding what one wants, or being unable to achieve it

Source

Owen Flanagan (The Really Hard Problem [2007], 2 'Expanding')

Book Reference

Flanagan,Owen: 'The Really Hard Problem' [MIT 2007], p.58


A Reaction

I took alienation to concern people's relationship to the means of production in their trade. On Flanagan's definition I would expect almost everyone aged under 20 to count as alienated.