The Chains of Exploitation: A Theoretical and Empirical Exploration

This paper sets a new empirical agenda for exploitation theory, through the notion of chains. Exploitation generally offers three attractive properties compared to more commonly used concepts - inequality and domination - in that it is simultaneously distributive, relational and openly counterfactual - yet it remains an underexplored notion. While both marxist and neoclassical traditions focus on dyadic relations - either worker-employer or through market exchange - most exploitative situations bear several relational components, where agents can simultaneously stand as exploited and exploiters. Building on a sociological-relational tradition, we identify four chains - I (connected), L (hinged), V (dual) and C (complicit) - which we argue represent the elementary structures of exploitation. We then contend that this meso-level approach, complementary to individual-transactional and structural accounts, bears potential for sociological analysis, and then explore how these chains materialize in various economic sites - within the production unit, on the market, in the domestic sphere, and by the state.