Alienation refers to a condition in which individuals become estranged from aspects of their human nature, their social world, or the systems and structures within which they live. In political theory, the concept is most prominently associated with Karl Marx, who argued that alienation is rooted in the capitalist mode of production. For Marx, alienation arises because workers do not control the products of their labor, the labor process, or the conditions under which they work. The product becomes an external power that dominates the worker, the labor process becomes mechanical and monotonous, and the worker becomes disconnected from their own creative potential. This estrangement reduces human labor to a commodity, undermining the worker’s sense of autonomy and identity. Marx outlined four major dimensions of alienation. The first is alienation from the product of labor, where workers create goods that do not belong to them and that confront them as alien objects. The second is alienation in the process of production, where the worker has little control over how work is organized and performed. The third is alienation from