A boom of “bullshit jobs” in the capitalist system

No doubt about it, we’re better off (and safer) in a capitalist system than in the USSR. But strangely enough, the capitalist system has produced as many useless jobs as the communist systems had. David Graeber, the anthropologist who coined the now famous phrase “bullshit jobs” wrote at length about the phenomenon:

“This is a profound psychological violence here. How can one even begin to speak of dignity in labour when one secretly feels one’s job should not exist? How can it not create a sense of deep rage and resentment. Yet it is the peculiar genius of our society that its rulers have figured out a way, as in the case of the fish-fryers, to ensure that rage is directed precisely against those who actually do get to do meaningful work. For instance: in our society, there seems a general rule that, the more obviously one’s work benefits other people, the less one is likely to be paid for it. Again, an objective measure is hard to find, but one easy way to get a sense is to ask: what would happen were this entire class of people to simply disappear? Say what you like about nurses, garbage collectors, or mechanics, it’s obvious that were they to vanish in a puff of smoke, the results would be immediate and catastrophic. A world without teachers or dock-workers would soon be in trouble, and even one without science fiction writers or ska musicians would clearly be a lesser place. It’s not entirely clear how humanity would suffer were all private equity CEOs, lobbyists, PR researchers, actuaries, telemarketers, bailiffs or legal consultants to similarly vanish. (Many suspect it might markedly improve.)” (Strike Mag)

David Graeber

In a recently published book titled The Utopia of Rules: On Technology, Stupidity, and the Secret Joys of Bureaucracy, David Graeber writes a (fascinating) little history of bureaucracy and explains how we got to where we are now. For several decades now, we have been producing overblown bureaucratic machines composed of many hierarchical layers, whose objectives are to map and control processes and produce forms. According to Graeber a majority of our jobs in the capitalist economy are in fact “bullshit jobs” whose impact and worth are more or less null. Bullshit job holders secretly know they contribute nothing to society, and it makes them suffer. As bureaucracy has spread to nearly all aspects of our lives, we’re more than ever in search of meaning.

Every aspect of our lives is increasingly fraught with red tape—endless forms whose vacuity can make us feel mad or stupid. One need only renew one’s identity papers to experience it. Bureaucracy will always make you feel stupid, wrong or guilty. To win against the system you need to be a judo master: turn the bureaucracy’s strength against itself, as French comics hero Asterix does brilliantly in The 12 Tasks of Asterix. His task is to accomplish an administrative formality in”the place that sends you mad”. The episode, broadcast in 1977, has not aged one bit!

Probably the best video ever about bureaucracy

Bureaucratic red tape marks out each important step in life—the death of a parent in particular is a sad high point in terms of red tape. It marks out our lives with numerous rituals we couldn’t imagine questioning: they are rites of passage we have long accepted. Usually rituals are a subject of interest for anthropologists. But because it is so excruciatingly boring, bureaucratic red tape has only seldom been studied by social scientists. Instead of being sent mad by bureaucracy as an object of study, anthropologists are understandably more drawn to artistically dense and meaningful symbols.

Only writers have dared take hold of the subject, for they do not fear the void. The work of Franz Kafka typically features lonely characters who have to face surrealistic situations and incomprehensible social-bureaucratic powers. Kafka explores the themes of alienation, existential anxiety, guilt and absurdity. That’s why the word Kafkaesque has entered the English language to refer to situations that involve a senseless nightmarish bureaucracy. Kafka’s characters dream of retaking the initiative and controlling their own destiny, making their own choices and becoming responsible, but they are always beaten by forces that are superior to them.