Erkenning en vervreemding op de digitale werkplek: AI-gemedieerde arbeid

Abstract

This essay examines the complex concerns surrounding AI integration in professional workplaces through the lens of Frankfurt School critical theory, particularly Axel Honneth's work on recognition. Moving beyond reductive narratives of technological progress or worker exploitation, I analyze how AI-mediated labour transforms professional identity and workplace relations. The analysis distinguishes between individual dimensions of alienation (loss of self-determination, domination, meaningless work, and destabilized achievement) and the essential social dimension that Honneth's recognition theory highlights. I argue that AI technologies risk introducing ‘second-order alienation’ by disrupting the interpersonal contexts that make work meaningful and recognition possible and impoverishing opportunities for genuine intersubjective recognition. However, following Honneth's rejection of technological determinism, I suggest that recognition-sensitive integration of AI could preserve and potentially enhance workplace sociality. The central challenge is maintaining workplaces as social spaces where mutual recognition remains possible despite technological mediation – a key consideration for sustaining social freedom in AI-transformed professional environments.