数字时代的认知分层与阶层重构

中文摘要

在数字时代，教育扩张、数字基础设施普及、平台机会增加和公共资源供给改善，在一定程度上拓展了社会成员获取信息、接受教育和参与市场的机会。然而，机会可及性的提高并不必然带来流动结果的均衡。一个值得进一步追问的问题是：为什么在相近教育经历、相似职业入口或类似数字工具接入条件下，不同个体在机会识别、资源转化和后续发展中仍会出现显著分化？本文将"战略性认知能力"（StrategicCognitiveCapacity,SCC）界定为个体在复杂社会系统中进行结构洞察、整体权衡、跨期整合与实践转化的综合实践理性，论证认知已成为数字时代的关键生产资料，SCC是连接宏观结构条件与微观主体行动的中介机制。研究发现，SCC通过机会识别、资源转换、长期行动和认知分工与平台调节四重机制影响阶层分化；其形成受家庭环境、教育质量、信息条件和制度保障的深刻塑造，且存在"最需要认知资源的群体最难稳定获得高质量认知资源"的可及性悖论。SCC本身具有方向中性，在制度约束有效时更易导向公善型合作，在制度失灵时则可能被用于机会主义行为。本文的理论贡献在于，在马克思阶级理论和当代阶层理论之间引入认知机制，说明数字时代的阶层流动不仅受生产资料占有制约，也受个体组织、理解和转化资源的能力影响；其实践意义在于提出"认知赋能"作为再分配与制度公平的补充路径，使制度机会更有可能进入个体生活世界并转化为持续发展能力

Abstract

In the digital age, educational expansion, the diffusion of digital infrastructure, increased platform opportunities, and improved supply of public resources have, to a certain extent, broadened social members' opportunities to access information, receive education, and participate in markets. Yet increased accessibility of opportunity does not necessarily bring balance of mobility outcomes. A question worth further investigation is: why, under similar educational experience, similar occupational entry points, or similar access to digital tools, do different individuals still diverge significantly in opportunity recognition, resource conversion, and subsequent development? This paper defines "Strategic Cognitive Capacity" (SCC) as the comprehensive practical rationality by which an individual performs structural insight, holistic weighing, cross-temporal integration, and practical transformation in complex social systems, and argues that cognition has become a key means of production in the digital age, with SCC as the mediating mechanism connecting macro structural conditions and micro subject action. The study finds that SCC affects class stratification through four mechanisms — opportunity recognition, resource conversion, long-term action, and cognitive division of labor with platform regulation; its formation is deeply shaped by family environment, educational quality, information conditions, and institutional guarantees, and exhibits an accessibility paradox: "the groups most in need of cognitive resources find it hardest to stably obtain high-quality cognitive resources." SCC itself is directionally neutral: when institutional constraints are effective it more readily leads to public-good cooperation, while under institutional failure it may be used for opportunistic behavior. The paper's theoretical contribution lies in introducing a cognitive mechanism between Marx's class theory and contemporary stratification theory, showing that class mobility in the digital age is constrained not only by ownership of the means of production but also by individuals' capacity to organize, understand, and convert resources; its practical significance lies in proposing "cognitive empowerment" as a supplement to redistribution and institutional fairness, so that institutional opportunities are more likely to enter individuals' life-world and be converted into capacities for sustained development.

关键词：数字时代；认知分层；战略性认知能力；认知作为生产资料；认知赋能；共同富裕

Keywords: Digital age; cognitive stratification; strategic cognitive capacity; cognition as means of production; cognitive empowerment; common prosperity