Abstract: The techno-feudalism discourse that emerged around 2020 finds its most significant representation in the work, Techno-feudalism, authored by French left-wing economist Cédric Durand. Departing from the “California Ideology”, Durand critiques contemporary high-tech innovation firms and the corresponding Silicon Valley consensus myth. The success of these firms does not draw from their leaders’ knowledge, cultivation, or innovation spirit, but from their monopolization of a new form of “land”: intangible assets. By creating diverse rentier modes such as intellectual property rents, natural monopoly rents, differential rents of intangible assets, and dynamic innovation rents, they formulated the hypothesis of techno-feudalism. In this framework, on one side lies the mythical kingdom of tech elites, lavishing the huge rents collected from intangible asset monopolies, while on the other side are precarious gig economy workers adrift in destitution. This constitutes a novel relation between class and production, which Durand suggests, paradoxically, paves the way for communism by fostering all-around individuals and partially alleviating alienation.

Key words: Cédric Durand, techno-feudalism, Marxism, intangible capital