Post-Fordist Illusions: Knowledge-Based Economies and Transformation

The argument that post-Fordism was able to overcome the oppressions and exploitations embedded within Fordist work relations has been subject to extensive critique for its evasion of capitalist antagonisms. However, there are particular analytic currents in radical thought which assert that knowledge-based economies hold within them not only radical, but also transformative possibilities. Such possibilities flow from developments in the forces of production and changes in the way in which surplus value is generated. These arguments tend to be located within what could be described as the knowledge economy as well as the creative industries. This article seeks to interrogate these arguments and suggests that, as with earlier discussions of post-Fordism, they are amenable to capitalist appropriation.