New Paths to Emancipation? A Critical Reading of Latin American Autonomist Marxism’s Conceptualisation of Emancipation

This thesis examines John Holloway’s theory of emancipation. Holloway is at the forefront of Latin American autonomist Marxism, a school of thought that has furthered a groundbreaking reading of Marx by drawing from a diverse range of critical theory traditions and the experience of radical social movements in the region (the Zapatista movement being the paradigmatic example). Holloway’s work stands out because it lays out a novel interpretation of emancipatory politics. He argues that capitalism organises human activity around abstract labour: a soulless human activity detached from people’s interests. Around abstract labour, capitalism develops institutions, values, and social relations which mirror the substance of abstract labour; therefore, restricting people from acting according to their wants and desires in their everyday. To resist oppression, Holloway enjoins people to individually and collectively practice anti-power, which he defines as self-determined activities that escape the command of abstract labour and, in the long term, threaten its existence. The thesis critically scrutinises the concept of anti-power drawing from Critical Theory, Decolonial Feminism, Political Ecology and Black Radical Thought. With this analysis, the thesis offers two major insights: that the radical materiality of anti-power dismisses subjective elements crucial for challenging oppression, and that reducing anti-power to self-determination overlooks other substantive contents that should guide anti-power apart from self-determination. The thesis concludes that Holloway’s concept of anti-power offers some important elements to think emancipatory politics, but in the end, it remains insufficient for radical emancipation. Through the critique of these limitations, the thesis suggests possible ways to overcome them.

Name dc:type.qualificationname

Doctor of Philosophy (PhD)

Level dc:type.qualificationlevel

Doctoral

Grantor dc:publisher.institution

University of Cambridge

Year dc:date.issued

2025

Author dc:creator

• Volonterio, Matias

Advisor dc:contributor.advisor

• Hamilton, Lawrence

• Autonomist Marxism
• Critical Theory
• Decolonial Feminism
• Emancipation
• Political Philosophy
• Political Theory
• Resistance

Licence

• https://www.repository.cam.ac.uk/bitstreams/2774098d-19ec-4b21-ad34-597630477925/download
• https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc/4.0/

Language dc:language

eng

DOI dc:identifier.doi

https://doi.org/10.17863/CAM.127980

OAI identifier oai:identifier

oai:www.repository.cam.ac.uk:1810/399428