Rejoinder to my critics

Abstract

To respond to my critics I concentrate on three systematic problems they have brought up in their articles: First, there are repeated concerns that my proposal for determining what we should regard as social labor may be too narrow, too conventionalist, or simply misleading (I); second, a number of contributions raise the question of whether I am right to discard the idea of “alienated” or “meaningless” labor as the standard of critique of contemporary labor relations and replace it with the weaker standard of democratic compatibility (II); and third, some of the contributors reproach me for being too moderate in my proposals for reforming labor relations and for conceptually excluding more radical alternatives from the outset (III). I will try to defend my own approach on all three counts.