Abstract

This article aims to explore the concept of alienation as relational concept in the phase of financial capitalism and global economic crisis. The critical value of contemporary forms of alienation goes hand in hand with the possibility of a social critique of present and future forms of relationship. Therefore, alienation is, first and foremost, a tool for social criticism. we can speak of estrangement, as synonymous with alienation, by reflecting on the fact that the alienation is also a difference of meaning, a differential shift that exists in the form of possibility. The estranged/alienated human being is an "excluded possibility", or rather, urgent questions on the reconfiguration of our social totality. I focus on three specific aspects: The formal structure of alienation and the social anthropology of alienation; The relationship between alienation and institutions; The concept of critique in relation to the concept of crisis.