Abstract:
Technological feudalism is an alternative criticism of capitalism, which has been raised by foreign scholars in recent years. Through the metaphor of “feudal restoration”, it reveals the monopolistic, parasitic and unproductive nature of digital capitalism. In order to avoid falling into the trap of “concept first”, it is of profound practical significance to analyze the basic logic of Marxist capitalism from the perspective of its critical theory. As a new term reform, it has a high research heat in the academic circles at home and abroad, showing two research paths of identifying “social form change”from the perspective of historical materialism and “rent return and oligopoly”from the perspective of political economy. The digital rents and “cloud fiefdoms”of techno-feudalism seem to be replacing the two pillars of capitalism: profits and markets. Based on the theory of the total process of production of Marxist capitalism, from the “upside down”logic that surplus value is reversed into average profit and profit is reversed into land rent, the theoretical presence of “general land rent”and excess surplus value in the operation of capital is found. From the paradox of capitalist market, clarify the burning of algorithmic preference control under the domination of cloud capital to free competition and technological progress. Further clarifying the deep crisis of capitalism in the digital age has certain theoretical value for breaking the myth of “techno utopia”and confronting the oppression of algorithmic control and data monopoly.