Notes on the Possibility of a Post-work Society in the Accelerationist Project of Srnicek and Williams

Abstract

The main objective of this article is to characterize the keys of Nick Srnicek and Alex Williams' accelerationist proposal to achieve a post-work society as part of their post-capitalist project. In a sociopolitical and cultural context that glorifies and exalts work as the only valid and meaningful form of subsistence and self-realization, left accelerationism—with its successes and failures—is presented as a political-philosophical alternative that stands out not only for offering a strong criticism of the institution of work and the dominant ethics that cements it in times of capitalist realism but also for the search to embody a post-work society that is capable of making subjects independent of wages. From the accelerationist perspective, given the neoliberal failure to address the multiple problems that arise from the logic of capitalist development and accumulation, labor, in its varied expressions and manifestations, is not alien to the capitalist mandates that govern and structure the aspirations, desires, and expectations of the subjects, where the poor, unemployed and marginalized are stigmatized in the name of money and work.