Labour, Multitudes, and New Social Subjects: Class Composition in
Cognitive Capitalism" Conference [1] in Cambridge this weekend (August 28-30th). This conference will be feature a large international gathering of radicals and militants, with a focus on autonomous inquiry in the digital era and a keynote open to the public by Antonio Negri, co-author of Empire.
This diverse revolutionary current believes that the era of the
"material labour" of the factory has been superseded by the "immaterial
labour" that includes unpaid family work, "service with a smile" and the
production of affects, and symbolic-linguistic production such as
computer programming and entertainment. There is also an increased
focus on the cybernetic communications of both capital, and as opposed
to vanguard parties, the natural antagonism of labour to capitalism and
their ability to subvert their own machinery - including the Internet.
Antonio Negri will give his keynote in French on the evening of the
28th on the topic of "J.M. Keynes, Guaranteed Minimum Income and the
Recent Events in France," an analysis of the recent revolt in France
against the neoliberal CPE.
To make this conference as widely available, there will be live audio-stream
available on Radio Vague [2] and an IRC chat room on chat.indymedia.org in room #immaterial. This room will allow people, regardless of their location in space, to discuss the speakers and ask questions. A full archive will also be made.
[1] http://www.geocities.com/immateriallabour/index.html
[2] http://www.radiovague.com/
[3] http://chat.indymedia.org