The abstraction of money, emancipation or alienation?

Abstract

This article aims to give an account of the abstraction undergone by money since the beginning of modernity. Calling on both theoretical developments (such as Georg Simmel’s) and social practice and even technical aspects, one of its central objectives is to pose a series of questions regarding digital currencies, particularly bitcoin, which, despite initially promising to be anti-capitalist, has, in fact, become its most sophisticated tool. Starting with two general views of money (functional and historical-political), the article then zooms in on a number of ideas that have come about since the end of the nineteenth century regarding the “dematerialization” of currency. Finally, it outlines questions on bitcoin and concludes with a reflection on the autonomization of money in light of the alienation of contemporary subjectivity.