Individuality is a product of market political economy, not its opposite

Evidence

The individual owes his crystallization to the forms of political economy, particularly to those of the urban market. Even as the opponent of the pressure of socialization he remains the latter’s most particular product and its likeness. What enables him to resist, that streak of independence in him, springs from monadological individual interest and its precipitate, character. — Theodor W. Adorno, Minima Moralia, 169

Categorization

• DEEPTHINKING: The dialectic posits that the very capacity to resist socialization is itself the socialized individual’s most particular product — resistance is not outside the system.
• XREF: Echoes Weber’s Protestant ethic inversion and Marx’s base-superstructure; also resonates with social-constructionist readings of ‘individuality’ in the Milgrom chapter on trade institutions. — connects to: The question is what produces individuality, not how society acts on individuals — Saba Mahmood, Politics of Piety: The Islamic Revival…, 137; Market ideology fragments classes into individual consumers and hides production; Individuality itself is an illusion produced by the law of value — Dirk Braunstein, Adorno’s Critique of Political Economy, 932 (+8 more)

Broader Connections

• The question is what produces individuality, not how society acts on individuals #expands (0.88) — Saba Mahmood, Politics of Piety, 137
• Individuality itself is an illusion produced by the law of value #corroborates (0.85) — Dirk Braunstein, Adorno’s Critique of Political Economy, 932
• Market ideology fragments classes into individual consumers and hides production #expands (0.80)
• Standardized production forces a compensating pretence of individualism #contradicts (0.75) — Theodor W. Adorno, The Culture Industry, 82
• Capitalist production relations are reproduced socially and ideologically, not just economically #expands (0.75)