“Neo-serfs” or New Proletarian Laborers?a Reflection on Techno-Feudalism Based on Marx's Theory

Western left-wing thinkers have claimed that the alliance between platform technology and capital has propelled contemporary society into a novel social formation akin to feudalism, which they term "techno-feudalism," and the widespread adoption of the platform economy has given rise to so-called "Neo-serfs" class. From the perspective of Marx's exploitation theory, "Neo-serfs" are not a reincarnation of the feudal serf class; rather, they are proletarian laborers. Platform capitalists, through the triple mechanisms of temporal colonization, tool alienation, and platform hegemony, achieve the infinite extraction of absolute surplus value, the concealed exploitation of relative surplus value, and the forced monopoly over the distribution of surplus value from platform users. A further examination of the three key elements—contemporary productivity, production relations, and the fundamental contradictions of society—reveals that techno-feudalism is neither a historical regression to feudal society nor a leap beyond the capitalist mode of production; rather, it represents a new manifestation of capitalism in the digital technology era.