Discussion
chapter 15 - machinery and modern industry
section 1 - the development of machinery: (there is a footnote here about the motive forces of history).
- the tool is the point where the conversion of handicrafts/manufacture into industry begins.
- all machinery consists of 3 parts: motor mechanism, transmitting mechanism and the tool or working mechanism. the tool is generally a version of what was previously used by the workman. the number of tools a machine can set in motion is free of organic impediments.
- as the size of machines increase, they require greater motive power - man, animal, wind and water not powerful or predictable enough - steam finally provided a mobile form of power entirely under human control, not geographically limited and with universal application. we then have co-operation but the operations now performed by machines, though a true machine system is only present when many machines are doing different kinds of work.
- initially, division of labour remains the same as in manufacture. however, now there is no need to consider the practicalities of execution of each process by hand, only to perform every stage and bind into a whole. the more continuous the process the more perfect the collective machine as the faster the subject of labour is passed through them. - some parts may of the process may require manipulation by human hand, but as soon as the role of man is reduced to one of attending only, we have an automatic system of machinery constantly susceptible to improvements.
- the immediate technical basis of industry was still handicraft and manufacture, but that was too limiting - it made machinery too dear, and the growth of artisans couldn't keep up with the growth of industry, as well as the size of the machinery required that grew well out of the scale that the collective worker would be able to perform. - revolutions in one arena of production produces revolutions in connected ones. and the revolutions in the modes of production of industry and agriculture required a revolution in the general conditions of social production i.e. in means of communication and transportation. so needed to build machines by machines.
- the instruments of labour in the form of machinery require the conscious application of science. the organisation of social labour process in manufacture is purely subjective - combination of detail labourers - in industry the system of machinery is purely objective, the labourer a mere appendage to existing material conditions of production. in cooperation and division of labour, the suppression of the isolated worker by the collective worker appeared accidental. with machinery the character of the labour process is a technical necessity dictated by the instrument of labour itself.
section 2 - value transferred by machinery:
- though we have machinery, we still require something made by man to harness natural forces. the increase in productive force brought about by machinery does not mean that more labour hasn't been expended.
- machinery is constant capital so creates no new value, on yields its own value over time. longer the machines life, the greater the difference between the value of machinery and the value transferred to the product. the difference is greater than manual tools as machines are more durable, wear& tear is regulated by scientific laws and the field of production is larger. on a large scale the value transferred tends towards nil.
- value transferred smaller the larger the product. the amount of product depends on velocity of working parts. given the value transfer rate, the amount transferred depends on total value of machines, less labour contains, less transferred, less value given up, more productive it is.
- production of machines by machines lessens value relative to extension and efficacy. vs products of handicrafts and manufacture, products of machinery have absolutely less value due to instruments of labour, but more relative to total value of product.
- difference between the labour a machine costs and the labour it saves (its degree of productiveness) does not depend on the difference between its value and the value of the tool it replaces. as long as the labour spent on the machine is smaller than the value added by the workman with his tool, then labour is saved. so productivity of machinery is measured by the labour power it replaces. though machinery cost as much as the labour power costs, still less than labour it replaces (as this includes surplus value).
- the use of machinery to cheapen product is limited: less labour must be expended in producing machine than is displaced by the employment of that machinery. further limited for capitalist: fixed by difference between value of machinery and value of labour power replaced by it. since value of labour power varies by time and country, sinks and rises above and below real value, the difference may sometimes be very great though real difference remain constant hence not all machines used everywhere.
section 3 - proximate effects of machinery on the workman:
1) allows employing those with bodies more supple but with less strength (women and children), enrolling whole family into workforce, spreading the family wage and breaking male resistance to capital.
2) gives capital new motives to extend the working day - the longer it is, the faster will the value of the machine be absorbed in the product, and the less time there will be for wear and tear due to non-use. since value of machine only its average social value, as new machines or new techniques of making the same machine are introduced, the overall value that the machine transfers falls with the fall in its social value, so needs to be transferred as fast as possible to reduce this effect. doubling the workers exploited would require a doubling of the amount of constant capital in buildings and machines etc., but doubling the length of the working day does not require this. when machinery is first introduced, the individual value of the product falls below its social value yielding exceptional profits which the capitalist tries to maximise by the lengthening of the working day. by opening up previously inaccessible parts of the population to capitalist exploitation and replacing existing workers with them, machinery creates a surplus working population that must bow to capital's wishes. the most powerful instrument for the reduction of labour time becomes the most powerful instrument for placing all the labourers' and his families' time at the disposal of capital.
3) intensification of labour can only reach a certain point without reducing the length of working day. once this length is fixed, gaps in the day need to be filled to produce as much as possible in a given time. this gives a measure of intensity or density of labour - the denser the hour, the more products it yields. efficiency of labour power is in inverse ratio to its duration. increase in intensity can be brought about by increasing the speed of the machinery and giving each worker more machinery to deal with.
section 4 - the factory:
- from p.o.v. of labour process, the use of machinery is the cooperation of many workers attending a system of productive machines compelled by a central power; but used by capital it is the modern factory - a vast automaton composed of mechanical and intellectual organs acting together for a common object subordinate to the moving force.
- division of labour is now between workers employed on machines, attendants, a small number of specialised workers (engineers etc.) and overlookers.
- the motion of the machinery is independent of the workers, so they can be replaced at anytime (e.g. in relays). it is easy to learn so there is no need to bring up a special class of specialised operatives, reducing cost of reproducing workers. rather than being part of a living mechanism as in manufacture, the worker is a mere appendage to a lifeless one.
- a tyrannical code of fines and penalties is thrown up to ensure economy of means of production, often near impossible to keep to so reducing wages. this economy of the means of production becomes a robbery of the means of life from the worker - air, light etc.
section 5 - strife between worker and machine:
- initially machines were a solution to a shortage of labour, later they began to replace workers and we got stuff like the luddites.
- as division of labour specialised the labourer, once machines replace them their labour power is unsaleable so they either die of flood other branches of industry.
- the choice of machinery coming gradually or suddenly is the choice between chronic drawn out misery and widespread acute misery.
- the "temporary" effects of machinery are really permanent as it is always seizing on new aspects of production.
- the estrangement from the instrument of labour becomes an antagonism.
- improvements in machines reduce the number of workers and change the type required.
- machines are also used to get around and break workers' resistance.
section 6 - the theory of compensation regarding workers displaced by machines:
- there is an argument that replacing workers with machines sets free an amount of capital that can employ the same workers. nonsense - first if machine costs same as workers replaced, no capital set free just changed the variable to constant ratio. if it costs less, then since more constant capital is required, even less workers are employed by a given amount of capital. more mechanics are not employed since making machinery must employ less (the cost including both necessary and surplus labour abd constant capital required to produce it).
- since the workers "freed" can no longer by as many commodities, if the situation continues workers producing those commodities will be discharged too, so even more workers out of employment.
- discharged workers can only find employment by new capital, not the old "freed" capital.
- all this stems from the capitalist employment of machinery, not machines themselves, as under capitalism the effects of machines are the opposite to what they should be.
- machinery may bring about an increase in employment in the branches of industry producing the means of production due to the huge increase in scale brought about by the employment of machinery.
- the more machinery seizes control of production, the greater the social division of labour, the greater the amount of products for the capitalist class to consume, so that class grows in number.
- with the opening of world markets, more foreign materials are used in production, so infrastructure must be improved and carrying trades grow.
- entirely new (though at first insignificant) industries spring up.
- more servants, ideological employments (priest etc.), leachers (landlords etc.) and criminals spring up.
section 7 - repulsion and attraction of workers by the factory system:
- more workers may be employed by the extension of business (though proportionally less variable capital, absolutely more as more capital in general) or by annexation of connected trades.
- since constant improvements can be made, the composition of capital is constantly changing, though interrupted by periods of rest during which there is only quantitative expansion.
- once machinery is its own (and its raw materials' suppliers') technical basis the mode of production acquires an elasticity limited only by the supply of raw materials and the disposal of the produce.
- the low cost of machine made products ruins foreign manufacture and handicraft, turning them into suppliers of raw materials.
- as the number of workers required is reduced, emigration is encouraged aiding the colonisation of other countries to become suppliers of raw materials.
- a new international division of labour is thrown up with most of the world supplying raw materials and food to the industrial centres.
- this power to expand in jump and dependence on world markets leads to a cycle of moderate production -> prosperity -> overproduction -> crisis -> stagnation. thus the uncertainty and instability brought by machines becomes the norm.
- the competition between capitalists for a share of the market leads to rivalry to displace labour powers by machines and attempts to lower wages below the value of labour power.
- a growth in the number employed requires a proportionally much more rapid growth in the capital invested. this growth is constantly interrupted by the industrial cycle and technical progress which throws out old workers and takes the place of employing new ones - attracting and repelling workers constantly.
section 8 - revolution effected in manufacture, handicrafts and domestic industry by modern industry:
a) overthrow of cooperation based on handicrafts and division of labour.
b) reaction of factory system on manufacture and domestic industries. the same principles of analysing the process used here as in the factories, so they become outside departments of the factory minus the technical basis which brings improvements to the conditions of work that there is in the factory.
c) modern manufacture.
d) modern domestic industries.
e) passage of modern manufacture and domestic industries into modern mechanical industries. at some point the increase of exploitation reaches natural barriers insurmountable without recourse to machinery. factory acts hastened this leading to a greater concentration of capital as small masters unable to comply. other problems such as fashions, made worse by increased communication and transport, lead to periods of starvation followed by periods of overwork. only reconciled when forced by act of parliament.
section 9 - factory acts, sanitary and educational clauses and general extension in england:
- effects and limits of these. some positive aspects - new methods of education, technical reason for subjugating humans to one task swept away, though under capitalism it is reproduced in an even worse form.
- division of labour is now based on science, constantly changing and improving - the technical basis is revolutionary. every economic progress becomes a social calamity.
- regulation of exploitation in factories was seen as interfering, but when it turned to "home labour" it was seen as an attack on parental authority. it was not misuse of parental authority that created capitalist exploitation, but rather the capitalist mode of exploitation that swept away the material basis of that authority allowing its exercise to degenerate into misuse. under other circumstances the dissolution of the family would lead to humane development.
- though capital initially compensates regulation in one place with more reckless exploitation elsewhere, right to equal exploitation forces regulation everywhere. the factory acts show the necessity imposed on the parliament of the ruling class to adopt in principle extensive measures against excesses of capitalist exploitation and hesitance to implement them.
- regulation leads to combining of numerous small isolated industries into a few large ones, accelerating the concentration of capital.
- it destroys old and transitional forms where the domination of capital is still partly concealed, but generalises opposition to this dominion.
- in individual workshops it enforces order, but by giving an insentive to technical improvements it accelerates the anarchy and catastrophes of capitalist production as a whole, the intensification of labour and competition of machines with the labourer.
- the destruction of small and domestic industries destroys the last resort of the "redundant" population and the last safety valve of the whole social mechanism.
- by maturing the material conditions and combining on a social scale the processes of production, it matures the contradictions and antagonisms of the capitalist form of production and thereby provides along with the elements for the formation of a new society, the forces for exploding the old one.
section 10 - modern industry and agriculture:
- though machinery used in agriculture was less physically injurious, it superseded the worker more intensely and was less strongly resisted due to the dispersion of the population.
- it obliterated the peasant, replacing them by the wage labourer so that the class antagonisms and desire for social change became level with that in the towns.
- it concentrated the working population, and thus the motive power of society, in the towns. all progress in agriculture under capitalism wrecks the long term fertility of the soil in favour of a short term increase.
- capitalist production develops the social combination of the processes of production at the expense of the sources of all wealth, the soil and the labourer.
Tuesday 10 February 2009
Chapters 12-14
Discussion
chapter 12:
- assume the length of the working day given, then for a given no. of labour powers, the surplus value extracted in that day cannot increase unless the balance between necessary and surplus labour time is altered. not considering the capitalist paying less than the value of labour power, so this can only occur by a lowering of the value of labour power, i.e. the value of the means of subsistence for said labour power. surplus value from lengthening the working day is "absolute surplus value", that from shortening necessary labour time is "relative surplus value".
- this is only possible under our assumptions by an increase in the productiveness of labour, which is only possible by revolutionising the labour process.
- an increase in productivity only affects the value of labour power if the commodity produced is a means of subsistance for labour power, and reduces this value only in the proportion to the extent it plays in that subsistence, e.g. if a commodity which constitutes half of the total value of the means of subsistence halfs its value, then the total value of labour power falls by one quarter.
- reduction in overall value of labour power may not be the aim of an individual capitalist, but that is still what is achieved. though competition isn't going to be analysised here as it is best left until after we understand the inner workings of capital, it is the laws of competition which force the individual capitalist to increase productivity. e.g. 1 hr's labour = 6p, the 6s is produced in an hour. suppose 12 articles are produced in 12hrs under current conditions of labour, the value of the means of production used in each = 6p, then each article = 1s. if some capitalist doubles productivity, producing 24 articles in 12 hrs, then the value of the means of production remaining the same, the value of each article falls to 9p - the same value is created in 12hrs as before, but now spread over more articles. the value of each article is now less than its social value, but real value is not individual but social, so if sold at the same price as before, the surplus value realised in the sale of each article rises by 3p. but now we have twice as many articles so need twice the demand, so it is best to sell the article for below its social but above its individual value. that way the individual capitalist gets extra surplus value regardless of whether the article in question forms part of the means of subsistence or not.
- for the individual capitalist, this extra surplus value vanishes as soon as the new level of productivity becomes the societal norm.
- the value of commodities is in inverse ratio to the productiveness of labour, as the value of labour power depends on these commodities. relative surplus value is directly proportional to this productiveness. hence constant striving for greater productiveness and cheapening of commodities.
chapter 13:
- as already mentioned, capitalism only really begins with the employment of relatively large numbers of labourers by a single capitalist. numerous labourers working together in the same or different connected processes is called co-operation.
- without altering the system of working, the employment of large numbers at once produces several advantages: labour becomes stamped automatically as average labour (differences between labourers in 1 group of twelve working for 1 master will even out more than in pairs of the same labourers employed by 6 different masters - in the latter scenario, some would get more than average value, some less); the means of production required to not increase in proportion to the number employed (e.g. less is required for a workshop for 20 than for five workshops holding four each) lowering ratio of constant to variable capital; many hands make light work - both in terms of mechanical strength and being to an extent omnipresent (one builder can't be working on all four sides of a building at once, several can); for complicated work, individual tasks can be apportioned out; more can be completed in a given time frame, important for e.g. gathering crops before they rot; allows work over an extended space e.g. dams and bridges are tricky to complete on your own. all this means that the combined working day produces, relative to a sum of equal isolated working days, a greater amount of products.
- since the capitalist needs the money for wages at the start of the process (under our assumptions) then the extent of co-operation is dependent on the amount of capital he has available for purchasing labour power - the the extent to which he has control over the means of subsistence of the labourers. this also applies to the amount available for constant capital, since the more labour powers employed, the more means of production are required. in other words, there is a minimum amount of capital required to turn isolated processes in a single social one.
- combined labour requires some kind of directing authority. once this becomes a function of capital, it acquires specific charictaristics. since the aim is to get the greatest possible surplus value, it is therefore to exploit the labour powers as much as possible, so the more labour powers employed, the greater the labourers resist, and the more capital has to combat this by applying counter-pressure. to the labourer co-operation is not his own act but brough about externally by the capitalist, so the connection with others appears ideally in the shape of the preconceived plan of the capitalist and practically as the powerful will of another subjecting their activity to its aim. the 2 fold nature of the process (production of use-values and of surplus-value) leads it to be despotic. the task of supervison is then passed to a specific type of waged labourer.
- since once they have sold their labour power, the labourer is no longer its owner, and the labourer only enters co-operation after the sale when they are but modes of existence of capital, the productive power of the labourer appears as the productive power of capital. their power is only possible under conditions provided by capital, so it appears to be a power of capital.
- previous forms of co-operation were based on common ownership of means of production or relations of domination and servitude. so co-operation is both the starting point of capitalist production and the first change effected on the labour process turning into a social one.
chapter 14
- co-operation based on division of labour as found in manufacture arises in two ways: 1) bringing together in one workshop different handicrafts required to produce one article, so other aspects of the crafts are lost, but those used are improved ; 2) the employment of many performing the same handicraft, and subsequent splitting of the handicraft into its component stages. either way we get a productive mechanism with human parts. the process is still dependent on the skill of the individual worker.
- each labourer doing only one task achieves several things: their whole body becomes tool for the task, perfects it through constant repetition and passes skills down through generations; the tools become specialised, as what was once used for several different stages is now used for only one (creating one of the material conditions of machinery); the gaps in the working day caused by changing of tools and place are reduced. on the down side, doing the same thing over and over and over again is boring and turns your brain into porridge.
- manufacture has two forms, heterogeneous and serial. the first arises from the mechanical fitting together of partial products (though it is a matter of chance whether the labourers are all brought together in one workshop - swiss watch manufacturers saved on workshops by having labourers work at home). the second consists of a series of connected processes formed on the same material, e.g. making needles. this way stages previously successive in time are now simultaneous but side by side in space. only possible by riveting each labourer to a single fractional detail.
- each labourer produces the raw material for the next, and the time for each stage is known by experience. the whole mechanism then becomes based on the assumption that a given result will be achieved in a given time, allowing processes to continue uninterrupted, simultaneously and side by side. the direct dependence of the workers on each other compels them to spend now more time than necessary, so that labour becomes more continuous, uniform, regular, ordered and intense than otherwise. the rule of taking no longer than socially necessary is a technical law of the process of production, rather than a result of competition as it appears in the production of commodities generally.
- since different tasks take different lengths of time, more labourers are required for some operations than for others, so we get a quantitative as well as qualitative division of labour, and the scale of production can only be increased by a proportional increase in all these groups (though some such as supervision don't require a proportional increase). these groups can have internal structures of cooperation (he gives an e.g. of glass manufacture where there are groups of 5 labourers each performing a different subtask at the furnace mouth). manufacture can also develop into combinations of manufacture e.g. producing the raw material or instruments for its main process, or an article for which the main product forms the raw material.
- machinery was used sporadically in the manufacturing period, giving us the science of mechanics, but otherwise the machinery of the period was the collective labourer. by habit the labourer bacame a never failing instrument whose connection to the whole mechanism compelled them to work with the regularity of a machine.
- differences in the complexity of tasks meant more or less training was required, so the values of labour powers were different giving us wage scales. all processes require some simple process anyone can do, hence the "unskilled", where absence of development becomes a specialty as opposed to specialty at the expense of all other development. the "skilled" require less training than the individual artificer, the "unskilled" none at all, in both cases the value of labour power falls and so surplus value increases.
- separation of labour in society into different industries comes about from two directions: physiological differences in the tribe/family with labour apportioned accordingly,
and independent communities with different means of production and so different products coming into contact with each other and exchanging. in the first what was once dependent grows more independent until exchange is the only connection to the whole, in the second what was independent becomes an interdependant branch of the whole by exchange. there is also the separation of town and country, but he's not dealing with it here. the greater the relative density of the population, the greater the division of labour in society.
- a certain degree of division of labour in society is necessary for the development of capitalism and so division of labour in manufacture, but the latter then develops and multiplies the former. industries producing the instruments of labour become more differentiated. if 1 industry previously connected to others is seized by manufacture, those others become more independent; if one stage in a process of production is seized, the other processes break off and become independent. territorial divisions of labour increase, the colonial system and opening of world markets fuel this. how division of labour seizes every sphere of society to sort humanity and develop only one faculty at the expense of all others will not be addressed here.
- but the division of labour in society differs in kind as well as degree from that in manufacture. in the former the products of each division are all commodities, and is brought about by the sale and purchase of products from different branches, with many different independent producers. in the latter the products are not commodities, it is brought about by the sale of the labour powers of many to a single capitalist with the number employed determined by the iron law of proportionality. though inner relations settle the social division of labour into a regular system of spontaneous growth, the demand for particular use-values and the law of value determining how much time society can spare for each commodity, the tendency to equilibrium is only a reaction to the constant upsetting of this equilibrium. in the workshop there is the undisputed authority of the capitalist, in society the only recognised authority is that of competition.
- the bourgeois mind praises control of the division of labour in the workshop and condemns it in society. in a society with capitalist production we have anarchy in the social division of labour and despotism in the workshop.
- the minimum number of labourers required for a process is determined by the existing proportion of the division of labour, but the advantages of further division can only be obtained by adding multiples of all the detail groups. an increase in variable capital requires an increase in constant capital at a faster rate than the increase in number of workers due to the increase in productive power obtained by the further division of labour - the quantity of means of production consumed rises in the same ratio as the productive power. so the minimum amount of capital required nust keep increasing - the transformation of the social means of production and subsistence into capital must keep extending.
- at first the worker sold his labour power as he did not have the means of production himself, but now his labour power refuses its services unless sold to the capitalist as it can only be exercised in the environment provided by him. while the individual labourer loses many facets of intelligence by doing only one task, that which is lost is concentrated in capital (as it has all the other workers' focussed skills). the worker is confronted with the intellectual potencies of the process of production as the property of another and a ruling power. capital represents the collective worker by cutting the individual worker down to a detail worker - a process taken further in industry by making science a productive force separate from labour. manufacture encourages the reduction of thought by the worker during the production process.
- once manufacture finds the best form of division of labour, it holds on to it until the instruments of labour are changed. decomposing handicrafts and forming a qualitative gradation and quantitative proportion in the social process of production. by creating deffinite division of labour in society it develops new productive forces. it is a particular method of getting surplus value - augmenting the self-expansion of capital at the expense of the labourer by crippling labour and creating new conditions for the lordship of capital over labour.
- the fall development of manufacture was held back by the resistance of skilled workers. since handicrafts were the foundation of the mechanism, it had no bframework but the labourers themselves, preventing capital from become the complete master of the whole workers' time. this prevented it truly revolutionising production and at a certain stage in its development this base came into conflict with the requirements of production created by manufacture itself.
- workshops creating the intruments of labour in turn created machines which finally swept away the handicrafts as the regulating principal of social production. this simultaneously removed both the technical reason for the annexation of the labourer to a detail function and the fetters this laid on the dominion of capital.
Chapters 10-11
chapter 10
- what is the limit of the working day? first there is the lower limit - the time required to reproduce the value of the labour power. the amount above this can be seen from the rate of surplus value, and has an upper limit: determined by the physical bounds of labour - it cannot be more than 24 hours, in fact for the labourer to be able to even partially reproduce his labour power it must be considerably less.
- since labour-power is sold for a day, the capitalist who bought it wants to maximise his use of it so tries to extend it as long as possible. but the labourer needs to be able to reproduce the same labour-power each day for the length of his working life, so if more is taken from him, shortening his working-life, he is being robbed. so under the laws of commodity exchange, both are have equal rights, the one as buyer and the other as seller, and so the length of the working day is determined by a struggle between the capitalist class and the working class.
- the example of corvee labour in the danubian principalities (most of which are now romania i think) as they joined a world market dominated by the capitalist form of production. there time spent working for oneself and for one's boss was physically divided - the first you did one your own land, the second on the lord's land. as the lords started trading more with the outside world, the amount of hours the demanded be expended on their land was ratcheted up further and further, but was obvious to the labourers, unlike under capitalism where the division of time is hidden.
- we then get an extensive history of the struggle over the length of the working day in england up to the 1860s. i'm not going to summarise it, but here are the basic points it illustrates: the effect of overwork on the health of workers; the gradual organisation of the working class; the need even on the part of capital to limit the working day to a natural one (not destroying it's workforce/cannon fodder for wars, ensure equal exploitation by all capitalists); the constant attempts to get around the new laws by capitalists; the fact that competition forced "good" capitalists to have bad practices until laws preventing them were passed and enforced.
- then there is a summary of struggle elsewhere, namely france and america, illustrating the centrality of struggles over the length of the working day.
- the labour comes out of the production process other than as he entered. at the market he appeared a free agent, but then finds that the time he is free to sell his labour power is the time he is forced to sell it. the working class has to band together and force an impassable social barrier to prevent the sale of their labour power being the sale of themselves and their families into slavery and death.
chapter 11
- the mass of surplus value produced for the capitalist by the labour-power he has bought for $3 is, if the rate of surplus value is 100%, $3.
- the value of variable capital he advances is equal to the average value of labour power employed multiplied by the number of labour-powers employed. so the magnitude of var capital varies directly as no. of labour powers. therefore the mass of surplus value produced = amount of var capital advanced times the rate of surplus value. i.e. it is determined by the compound ratio of the no. of labour powers exploited and the degree of exploitation of each individual labour power. or: with S= mass of surplus value, s=surplus value supplied by each labour power in an average day, v=variable capital advanced each day for one labour power, V= total var capital, P=value of average labour-power, a'/a (surplus labour/necessary labour) = degree of exploitation, n=no. of labour powers then:
S=s/v x V and P x a'/a x n
(supposing that the value of average labour power is constant and all labour powers employed are average)
- a decrease of one factor can be compensated by a corresponding increase in another. e.g. a decrease in variable capital can be compensated by an increase in exploitation; a decrease in no. of labour powers increase by an increase in hours. therefore within certain limits the supply of exploitable labour is independent of the supply of labourers. the mass of surplus value is unaltered if a fall in degree of exploitation is compensated by a proportional increase in variable capital/no. of labour powers. the natural limit of the working day sets the limit of this compensation. if the value of labour power and rate of surplus value are given, the mass of surplus value varies directly to amount of variable capital advanced but is unaffected by the ratio of constant to variable capital. this apparent contradiction is going to be addressed later.
- the labour set in motion by the total capital of society each day can be regarded as a single working day. if the length of the day is given, physically or socially, the mass of surplus value can only be increased by increasing the no. of labourers. population growth is the limit to production of surplus value by society's capital. if the population is given, the limit is set by the possible lengthening of the working day. this only holds for the form of surplus value considered thus far - see next chapter for a different kind.
- it can be seen that there is a minimum of exchange value in money or commodities required before it can be transformed into capital. first there is the minimum constant capital required and variable capital for at least one labourer. more means of production are required than if the labourer was working for themselves. if the capitalist also works he is but a hybrid between capitalist and worker, at some stage he must devote his whole time to the role of capitalist - appropriating and controlling the labour of others and the sale of the products. medieval guilds limited the no. of labourers employed by 1 mast - one only starts to truly become a capitalist when these limits are greatly exceeded - when a quantitative difference becomes a qualitative one.
- at different stages and in different spheres of capitalist production, the sum required to become a capitalist varies. sometimes the minimum required is greater than any individual has, giving rise to state subsidies and the formation of societies holding legal monopolies.
- in the process of production capital acquired the command over labour (functioning labour-power). as personified capital, the capitalist takes care that labour does work regularly and with the proper intensity.
- capital becomes a coercive relation compelling the working class to do more work than their life wants demand. it first does so under the existing technical conditions - hence the extension of the working day as prevalent in traditional industries such as baking as in the modern ones.
- from the point of view of the simple labour process the labourer stands in relation to the means of production as mere means and material of their own intelligent productive activity. from the point of view of the valorisation process the means of production are transformed in the means for absorbing the labour of others. the labour no longer employs the means of production, but vice versa. instead of being consumed by him as material elements of productive activity, they consume him as the ferment necessary to their own life process, and the life process of capital consists only in its movement as value constantly expanding and multiplying itself.
- the transformation of money into means of production transforms the means of production into a title and right to the labour and surplus labour of others. it is the inversion of the relation between dead and living labour, value and the value-creating force, mirrored in the consciousness of capitalists.
Chapters 7-9
chapter 7:
- first the labour process is considered isolated from particular social conditions. as such it is the application of the forces of nature against nature, the materialisation of humanities will and intellect. to do this requires close attention by the worker so that the work is in consonance with his purpose. the less attractive the nature and mode of the work, the more forced is this attention.
- the 3 elementary factors of the labour process are then 1) the personal activity of man (work); 2) the subject of that work; 3) the instruments used. the subjects of work can be further divided into those spontaneously provided by nature - virgin forest, wild fish, ore yet to be dug out etc. anything that has been filtered through previous labour is raw material - extracted ore, etc. all raw material is a subject of labour, not all subjects of labour are raw material. it may be the main substance of the product or an accessory such as coal burnt to power a boiler, oil on a wheel, chlorine added to linen, lighting in a workshop etc. instruments are things interposed between the labourer and the subject of labour. they're important for investigating old economic forms and their accompanying social conditions, mechanical ones being most important and those for the production of luxury items the least important. under instruments we can also include things which enable production: land, workshops, canals, roads, etc.
- the labour process then alters material according to a previous design, the process disappearing in the product. use-values enter the process to come out as new use-values, to then enter a new labour process as means of production or to be consumed. therefore products are the results and essential conditions of labour process. whether any one use-value is considered a raw material, instrument of labour or product is determined by its function in the particular process - as this varies, so does its character. though the labour that created the product is not palpable, an unused product is useless, so only by being brought into contact with living labour can it retain it's character of use-value.
- the labour process is a process of consumption where the product is distinct from the consumer - in individual consumption the product is the consumer.
- then consider the valorisation process, the labour process under capitalism. now the labourer works under the control of the capitalist and the product belongs to the capitalist. the capitalist wants to produce use-values, with value in exchange, and wants more value than he put in - surplus value.
- to find the value of the product, the capitalist needs to calculate how much social labour is in it. 1st, raw materials: their value is already calculated in their price, say $10. 2nd, wear of instruments: also calculated in their price, as the fraction of it that is on average used up in the production of an average one of whatever the product is - say $2. if 24hrs are required to produce $12 of gold, we have 2 working days already in the product. but the value of the means of production transfered to the product is only that value which represent the labour embodied in average means of production for this product - if gold spindles are used instead of the social average of steel, not greater value is transferred than if they were steel, if cotton is below average quality resulting in above average waste, the value of the cotton going into waste is lost.
- at the end the total quantity of labour time is represented by a deffinite quantity of the commodity (only the socially necessary labour-time counting of course), the raw material having acted as an absorbent of the labour. if the labourer is paid the value of his labour-power, which is the value of all the things he needs to reproduce it each day, costing $3, embodying 6 hours of social labour time, then if it take 6hrs to produce the product, the value of the product is $10+$2+$3=$15, the price paid for its production. but the capitalist paid for the use of the labour power for a whole day, which is consumed by being put to work as labour, so he can make the labourer work for another 6 hrs, using up the same amount of means of production as before, but now the value of the product is 2 x ($10+$2+$3) = $30, whereas the cost of production was $27, and taadaa!, surplus value. any extra expended either by the labourer or more than average consumption of the means of production in the process does not count in the value of the product and will be a loss for the capitalist, so he ensures that no more waste of time, instruments or materials occurs other than those socially necessary.
- so in summary, the process of producing value past the point at which the value paid by the capitalist is replaced by its equivalent is the process of producing surplus value. in the simple labour process it is the quality of the labour that is important, in the valorisation process, it is quantity. the process of production as the unity of the labour process and the production of value is the process of the production of commodities. the process of production as the unity of the labour process and the production of surplus-value is the process of the capitalist production of commodities. finally, skilled labour is just considered as simple labour multiplied as the labour put into training etc. is counted.
chapter 8:
- since the value of the means of production (instruments and raw materials) are preserved and transferred to the finished product as they are consumed, never transferring more than their total value, the capital put into them is called constant capital. that put into labour power on the other hand creates new value, consisting on the equivalent of that which it cost plus an increment of surplus value which varies, so it is variable capital.
- the quality of the labour preserves the old value, the quantity adds the new value. the value preserved is directly proportional to the value created, and is equal to the amount of value lost by the means of production. changes in the quantitative ratio between the two types of capital does not alter their qualitative differences.
chapter 9:
- the surplus value created in the production process over the value of labour power gives us the degree of exploitation of labour power.
- this ratio is reflected in the working day, where first the labour creates the value necessary to reproduce his labour power, so is necessary labour since he would have to do this regardless of social conditions, and after that point all labour is surplus labour. so the surplus labour time to necessary labour time is equal to the ratio represented by the degree of exploitation.
- in the same way we can have fun splitting up the total time spent creating a product (or indeed the product itself) into sections during which a partial product was produced (or in which the value is embodied) with the value of the constant capital advanced, the variable capital advanced and the surplus value created. but of course this does not mean that in that time all that value was created, as a portion of that value will have been preserved from the means of production. marx then pulls apart some daft argument claiming all profit comes from the last hour so if you reduce the working day by an hour the capitalist loses all his profit.
- the portion of the total product that represents surplus value is surplus produce. under capitalism then wealth should be represented by the relative magnitude of the surplus produce to the portion of the total produce representing necessary labour.
- the sum of necessary and surplus labour in a day is the working day, to be investigated in the next chapter.
Chapters 4-6
chapter 4:
- the circulation of commodities is the starting-point of capital. capital is first money. M-C-M is a different kind of transformation from C-M-C. the circulation of commodities begins with a sale and ends with a purchase - the circulation of capital is the inverse.
- C-M-C starts and ends with a commodity, the movement brought about by the intervention of money. M-C-M money is the start and end, brought about by a commodity. in M-C-M money is only advanced not spent as the owner intends to get it back. in C-M-C money only returns by a repetition of the act, as use-value is the aim, the start and end are qualitatively different. in M-C-M the motive for exchange is exchange-value, the end and aim are of the same use-value/quality, and can differ only in quantity. so M-C-M is really M-C-M' where M' = M + xM = the original sum advanced plus an increment - surplus value. the process by which value adds value to itself is the movement that converts it to capital.
- in C-M-C the fact the two commodities are of the same value doesn't deprive the circuit of meaning as it would if the two ends of M-C-M were of the same value.
- qualitatively, M & M' are the same so there is as much inducement to augment M' as there was for M. both are limited expressions of exchange value, so both can be increased to closer to absolute wealth. if M' is withdrawn from circulation it is no longer capital, but generally the end of one M-C-M' circuit is the start of a new one.
- the person advancing the money becomes a capitalist, their subjective aim becomes the expansion of value, the objective basis of M-C-M. only as this becomes the sole motive for their operations do they function as a capitalist - capital personified and endowed with consciousness & will. neither use-values nor profit from any one transaction are their aim, but rather never-ending profit-making attained by always throwing money back into circulation.
- C-M-C: money form of exchange value only exists for the exchange vanishing on completion. M-C-M: money & commodity only different modes of existence of value itself, the general and particular modes respectively. value constantly changing form from one to the other without being lost, so assumes an automatic active character. value is the active factor in the process, expanding itself, for which it requires an independent form by which it can be identified at any time - money. instead of representing relations between commodities it now enters into relations with itself.
- only by having surplus value added does money become capital, but as soon as it does have surplus value, the distinction between the original and surplus vanishes. value becomes value in process, money in process - capital. regardless of the type of capital, the general formula is M-C-M'.
chapter 5:
- the distinction between M-C-M and C-M-C only exists from the POV of the capitalist.
- in simple exchange both parties gain use-values they need, and assuming no outside circumstances (e.g. one ripping the other off) the same exchange value remains throughout in the hands of the owner, it merely changes form, implying no change of magnitude - exchange does not add value.
- assume exchange is of non-equivalents: since only owners of commodities are at the market, all are both buyers and sellers. if all commodities are above or below their value, an owner loses or gains as much in selling as he gains or loses buying, so it evens out, there is no surplus value produced. and the idea of a non-producing only consuming class is absurd as they would have to get their money from somewhere. even if A sells $40 of wine to B for $50 of corn, still no surplus value has been created because there is a total of $90 both before and after the exchange. so in exchange of equivalents or non-equivalents, no surplus value arises - capital cannot arise from circulation.
- we're leaving merchant and money-lending capital aside for the moment as they operate only in the sphere of circulation, so cannot yet be explained, though we'll find they're derivative and why came about first later.
- outside of circulation, the owner of a commodity is in relation only to his own commodity, but though he alter it and add value, this is not self-expanding, surplus value. so capital cannot originate outside the sphere of circulation either. bugger.
- so surplus value is going to be explained on basis of laws regulating the exchange of commodities, with a starting point of the exchange of equivalents. though everything will be bought and sold at real value, still the end value will be greater than the starting value, and will take place both within and without circulation.
chapter 6:
- the change must be in a commodity bought, even though at its full value - the change must be in its consumption of its use-value - the use-value must be a source of value, the consumption being the embodiment of labour and so creation of value.
- this commodity is labour-power, the aggregate of physical & mental capabilities in a human being exercised whenever producing any use-value.
- for labour-power to be for sale as a commodity, two conditions are required. the possessor of labour-power must be the legal owner of the labour-power, so can meet with possessor of money on the market as buyer & seller, and they should only sell the use of this labour-power for a deffinite period of time as otherwise that's slavery. secondly the possessor of labour-power must not be in a position to sell any other commodities.
- to produce commodities need means of production and means of subsistence since all are consumers before and after producing - only after sale can a commodity satisfy the needs of its owner, the time necessary for its sale added to that of production. the division into labourers and money-owners is not natural but historical. capital only possible with the emergence of the free labourer.
- the value of labour-power (henceforth LP) is determined by the labour-time necessary to produce it - so far as it has value it represents a definite quantity of the average labour of society. since LP exists only as a capacity of a living individual, it presupposes that individuals existence, so the value of LP is the value of the means of subsistence required to maintain the labourer in a normal state - which also has certain historical and moral elements. since the labourer is mortal and capital requires the constant presence of LP, the value also includes the value of reproduction - the means of subsistence for their future replacement. expenses of education for a particular type of labour also enter into the value of LP. so the value of LP varies with the value of means of subsistence/the quantity of labour-time needed for their production.
- if the commodities required for subsistence are A needed each day, B each week, C quarterly etc. then this is averaged out over a year to find the value of each day's labour. so if this average is say 6 hrs social labour time, embodied in $3, $3 is the value of one days labour.
- the use-value of LP does not immediately pass to the buyer - the alienation of LP and its appropriation by the buyer is separated by time - money functions as a means of payment, the worker gives credit to the capitalist. the price is fixed by the contract, but paid later. for the purposes of the investigation we'll assume the worker gets the price stipulated immediately.
- the money owner buys all the means of production. the consumption of LP is both the production of commodities and of surplus value, and as all consumption it is completed outside the sphere of circulation. so we now leave circulation where everything is above board and in accordance to rights, freedom of will, equality before the law, each for himself working to the common harmony etc. and of into the sphere of production.
Chapter 3
- money has several functions: measure of value, standard of price, medium of circulation, means of payment, and money of the world. these are all seperate, independent, related but contradictory functions of the money commodity.
- as measure of value, money is the form assumed by the values of commodities, and so converts all values into quantities of the money commodity (which he assumes to be gold), but only ideally/mentally. as standard of price it measures those quantities of gold by a fixed unit quantity of gold (which is determined by the state).
- a change in value of gold does not affect the standard of price - an ounce of gold is always and ounce of gold - nor the function of measure of value, since the change will effect the relative value of all commoidities - assuming their values remain the same, their relative values between each other will remain the same, but be expressed in more or less gold. the laws governing fluctuations in value are those of the elementary form of value.
- the weight of gold represented by each name of a money quantity can be completely different from the weight name that it's money name originated, as long as it is a definite fixed quantity (generally fixed by the state) e.g. 1 pound doesn't have to mean a pound of silver in can be 0.392943kg of gold, as long as it is socially accepted that that is what 1 pound refers to.
- the following relates to issues raised in the discussion of the first chapter: though price is the expression of the magnitude of a commodity's value as the exchange ratio of that commodity with the money commodity, it does not follow that the expression of this ratio is necessarily that of the commodities value i.e. though one commodity may be twice the price of another, it does not necessarily mean it is twice the value. as soon as an article's magnitude of value is converted to the price form, the relationship between that article and the socially necessary labour time required to produce it takes the shape of a more or less accidental exchange ratio between a single commodity and another, money. this ratio may express the real magnitude of value or the quantity of gold deviating from that value for which in the circumstances it may be sold. the possibility of deviation of price from the magnitude of value is inherent in the price form itself, but this is not a defect, but adapts price to a mode of production whose laws impose themselves only as the mean of apparently lawless irregularities that compensate each other.
- furthermore, items such as honour, courage, etc. can through being given a price acquire the form of commodities though no human labour has gone into them so they have no value, or conceal other value relations in for instance the price of uncultivated land.
- a commodity cannot be both the original article and gold at the same time, even though it may be imagined so in the price form. in order for a commoidty to serve the purpose of universal equivalent to its owner, it must be replaced by real gold. so we have circulation: commodity a --sale--> becomes money --purchase--> commodity b. here the commodity enter as a commodity and metamorphoses into a new one, passing through a transient form of money, so forms a circuit. of course for the original owner of the money, the sale was in fact a purchase, the last metamophorsis of his commodity, and for the original owner of commodity b the purchase was a sale, the first metamorphosis of his commodity. so considering the sales and purchases of all commodities, we have them all entering circulation and then falling out as commodities, but money stays in as the medium of circulation. thus all the commodities are intricately linked together in a web of social relations outside the control of the actors, and breaking all barriers of time, place and individual relations imposed by barter.
- though buying and selling are antithetical to one another, they have a unity and if there is too great a time gap between them it can cause a crisis. all the antitheses immanent in commodities - use-value and value; private labour having to manifest itself as directly social labour; particular concrete labour forced to pass as abstract labour; personification of objects and representation of people by things - assert and develop modes of motion in the different phases of metamorphosis, and these modes imply the possibility of crisis.
- from point of view of money, once it is first sold directly at its source of production for another commodity, it constantly moves further and further away from its starting point, always in the hands of a buyer - the two antithetical process of sale and purchase are for money one and the same. as such money is the expression of the circulation of commodities changing form, it is not the case that money is the one moving commodities around.
- the amount of money required by circulation is determined by the sum of all the prices of commodities in circulation. of course, if the value of gold changes, prices will change, but this is caused by gold as a measure of value not as a medium of circulation. if this happens, it will first affect whatever commodity is exchanged directly for gold at its source, and so there will always be the required quantity of money in circulation - 1st prices vary inversely as value of money, then quantity of circulating medium varies as prices do.
- the velocity of the medium of circulation is how many times 1 particular coin changes hands in a given period i.e. how many metamorphoses of commodities have taken place. this affects the quantity of money required too - the greater the velocity the less money required to effect circulation and vice versa. a slow in velocity reflects a general separation in the acts of buying and selling, a stagnation in the social interchange of matter.
- if prices constant: increase of circulating commodities and/or decrease in velocity --> increase in quantity of circulating medium (and vice verse).
- if prices rise: proportional decrease of circulating commodities or proportional increase in velocity --> quantity of circulating medium constant.
- if prices fall: proportional increase of circulating commodities or proportional decrease in velocity --> quantity of circulating medium constant; quicker increase of circulating commodities or decrease in velocity --> increase in quantity of circulating medium constant (and vice versa)
- all the above changes tend to compensate each other so over time the quantity of circulating medium doesn't vary as much as might expect.
- since in the act of circulation coins quickly lose weight and so deviate from the weight their denomination represents - the name and the substance begin to seperate - with the result that the weight, that is standard of price, deviates from the circulating medium, the latter ceasing to be a real equivalent. this requires legislation fixing how much deviation is allowed before coins cease to be legal tender, and from this it is but a small step to replace coins with tokens.
- thus the function of gold as coin becomes independent of the value of gold and something relative worthless such as paper can take it's place. only nonconvertible paper money is being considered here not credit money (mentioned later). however the paper money cannot exceed the amount of gold which would circulate if it were not replaced be paper - if this happens as well as falling into disrepute the paper would only represent that quantity of gold which is actually required. eg if twice as much paper as would be gold then 1 pound would be the money name of 1/8 an ounce of gold rather than 1/4, and prices would be similarly affected.
- money can only be replaced by tokens when functioning as the circulating medium - each piece of gold is only a means of circulation whilst it circulates, but in the case of paper money, this is always the case. as the medium of circulation is the transient and objective reflex of prices of commodities, so serves only as a symbol of itself and can be replaced by socially valid tokens. this can only happen in the area controlled by the state imposing the social validity of the tokens, i.e. national territories, but this is the only sphere in which it responds as means of circulation completely, so it can be separated from its metallic form and replaced by paper.
- since money does not reveal what has been turned into it, all commodities are convertible to money. but since money is a commodity it is an external object capable of being the private property of anyone - social power becomes private power. since value measures degree that a commodity can attract all other commodities, money measure the social wealth of it's owner. money has no bounds qualitatively speaking - it can become anything - but has limits quantitatively, so the desire to hoard money is insatiable. these hoards then serve as reserves for the supply and withdrawal of money to or from circulation so that there is always the necessary amount of money.
- due to time differences in the production of different commodities - some take longer, are seasonal etc., a seller may be ready to sell before the buyer is ready to buy. other commodities are sold for use for a given period e.g. houses, in which case the buyer only receives the use value at the end of the term. in these cases the purchaser makes the purchase as the representative of future money and becomes a debtor, the vendor a creditor. from the point of view of the buyer, the 2nd metamorphosis of their commodity is taking place before the 1st. money functions first as measure of value and second as means of payment - as the circulating medium it goes into a hoard until the date fixed for payment - and is no longer the means by which circulation is brought about, but brings it to a close as the universal commodity.
- so we have:
seller: C --> M to satisfy want
hoarder: C --> M to keep commodity in money form
debtor: C --> M to pay
money, the value form of commodities, is now the end and aim of sale. as means of payment, money expresses an already existing social relation, rather than its role as medium of circulation of being the reflex of relations existing and originating only in circulation.
- as with currency of circulation, the amount of money required for payment depends on the sum of payments due in a given period and the length of debtor-creditor-debtor chains which cancel each other out leaving only a balance to pay.
- now the inevitable implied contradiction: as far as the payments balance, money functions only as money of account, measure of value; but if payments have to be actually made, money does not function as medium of circulation, a transient agent, but as individual incarnation of social labour, the universal commodity. the contradiction manifests itself in monetary crises which occur when a lengthening chain of payments and artificial institutions to settle them have been established and this mechanism is significantly disturbed. then money of account must become hard cash, use-values become valueless, "value vanishes in the presence of its own independent form" and the antithesis of commodities and value form heightened to absolute contradiction.
- so now we have: amount of money required in given period = sum of prices to be realised + sum of payments falling due - balancing payments - number of circuits of the same piece of coin serving as means of circulation and payment (given the velocities of currency of means of circulation and payment). quantity of means of payment required for all periodic payments is directly proportional to the lengths of those periods.
- as system of credit extends, so does money's function as means of payments outside the sphere of circulation - taxes, rent, etc. replacing payment in kind. hoarding vanishes with progress and reserves of means of payment build up against dates payments are due grow.
- when leaving the national spheres of circulation, money must take a socially recognised form, so returns to bullion. as money of the world it serves as universal means of payment and universally recognised embodiment of all wealth. it is used to settle international balances when normal exchanges of commodities not possible or for a general transfer of wealth. it then enters the different national spheres of circulation. where bourgeois production developed, hoards are limited to the minimum required for its functions - if it is too much above it generally reflects a stagnation in the circulation of commodities, the interrupted flow of commodity metamorphoses.
Chapters 1-2
chapter 1
- commodities have use-value and value. there use value is their physical utility to humanity - a table for eating off etc - so is concerned with the quality of the commodity. value, which manifests itself in exchange value, is something different and independent of the material form of the commodity, and only concerned with quantity.
- the reason we know that value is so, is because for say a table to be worth four earrings, they must have something in common to equate them, but they have no physical properties in common. or none that are relevant - i suppose the earrings might have diamonds and so contain carbon like the wood, and the atoms of both are composed of protons, neutrons and electrons, but these obviously don't affect why 4 earrings are considered to be worth one table, especially when we compare either one to some other commodity.
- thus the only common property left to them is the amount of labour expended in their creation, which therefore must be the substance of value. labour is measured in time, so it must be some measure of labour time, but since the commodity will have to compete with others of it's like, it must be socially necessary labour time - the average time it takes to make one of a given commodity, so just taking a year to make a shoe doesn't necessarily mean the shoe will be worth more. furthermore, since only commodities with diffrent use-values - produced by different types of useful labour - can confront each other as values, so the labour time making up value must be abstract human labour, since otherwise different types of labour eg welding and crochet could not be equated.
- value can only manifest itself in a commodity to commodity relation, and has an elementary form when it is exchanged for just one other commodity, eg x comA for y comB, where comA is in relative form and comB in equivalent. in this state, comB serves only to express the value of comA, its own value is not expressed (though the inverse is implied, in which it's value would be expressed). thus the value of comA must express its value in the use-value/bodily form of another commodity, it can't do it alone. if the value of com B is constant, the rel. value of A expressed in B rises and falls with the value of A, if the value of A is constant the rel. value varies with that of B, and if both vary by the same amount in the same direction, the rel value remains constant. and since in the equivalent form, the use-value of B becomes that of being exchangeable for A, of representing A's value, the specific useful labour that made it now expresses abstract human labour.
- if the elementary form is expanded to a series of comparisons with every available commodity all with a in relative form, we get the expanded form of value. in this form it is clear that it is exchange determining value not vice versa since it make no difference which commodity acts as equivalent.
- when we reverse the equations, we get the general form of value, with A serving as equivalent to all commodities. now the values of all are manifested in one, differentiating value from the use-value of any one commodity, and all commodities are brought into relation with each other. the commodity chosen as this universal equivalent must be socially recognised as such. since this one commodity that functions as uni equivalent, the manifestation of the values of all commodities, and so of the human labour that produced them, the labour that produces it (the u.e.) becomes the manifestation of all abstract human labour. and of course, now only the u.e. can be in the position of equivalent and so directly exchangeable with other commodities, while the u.e. cannot take the relative form - if it does we've gone back to the expanded form.
- when one particular commodity becomes the universal equivalent for all other commodities, monopolising this position, it passes from the general to the money form. and the elementary form of a commodity with money becomes the price form for that commodity.
- ah, at last, fetishism, and my favourite quote so far is the one about tables standing on their heads as commodities and sprouting grotesque ideas from their wooden brains, its genius. anyway, that's his introduction for saying that the mystical character of commodities can come from neither their use-value nor human labour since both have some grounding in material reality, so it must arise from the commodity form itself.
- since all sorts of human labour is expressed equally as values, the social character of labour (the fact that it is production for those other than the producer) appears only as a social relation between things, the products of the labour of producers, rather than between the producers themselves. thus the fetishism of commodities, inseperable from the production of commodities, has its origin in the social character of the labour that produces the commodities.
- things are only commodities because they are the product of the labour of private individuals/groups of individuals carrying on independent work. the sum of their labour forms the labour of society but since they have no social contact until they exchange products, the social character of the labour of each is only shown in the exchange, creating an indirect relation between the producers and a direct one between the products. so to the producers their relations appear as social relations between things and material relations between person.
- the distinction in a commodity between use-value and value only becomes important when things are produced specifically for exchange as then their value must be taken into account before production. at this point the labour of the individual acquires a 2-fold character: 1) it must satisfy a social want so as to remain part of the collective labour of society - the product must be useful to others; 2) it can satisfy the producers wants only insofar as the mutually exchangeability of all kinds of useful labour is an established social fact so that the labour of each ranks equally with that of all - an equalisation that can only come about from the abstraction from their inequalities - all products of labour must have value.
- the quantities of value in each commodity vary continually independently of the will, foresight and action of the producer, as their own social action appears to them to take the form of the action of objects with rule the producers rather than being ruled.
- the social division of labour is constantly reduced to that required by society because, despite accidental and constant fluctuations in exchange relations, the labour time socially necessary constantly reasserts itself.
- he then explains why bourgeois economy sucks - we naturally study social life as it has been established - and looks at various other hypothetical economies. first there is the stranded lone islander who must apportion his time according to difficulty of tasks and necessity of their products; the middle-ages where everyone was dependent, social relations were clear and not mystified in commodities, for instance 4 hours work personally by the serf for his lord was just that, his personal labour time of a definite quantity spent in service of the lord - so relations of labour were mutual personal relations; a peasant family where labour is distributed according to age, sex, ability etc., each being a clear portion of the labour power of the whole family; and finally a community of free individuals with common ownership of production, with the labour of each consciously applied as part of the total social labour, producing a total social product that is then partly reinvested and partly distributed among members according to labour performed. in the last case labour time would be distributed according to a social plan to maintain the proper proportion of work to be done and also serve as the measure of the portion of the total product an individual would be entitled to - perfectly transparent relations.
- there's a bit about religion being reflex of the real world, and so the life process of society which is based on material production will remain mystical until production is done by freely associated individuals and consciously regulated by them in accordance to a social plan, but we have to go through a long and painful process before the conditions for this will spontaneously arise.
- the chapter ends with more slagging off of bourgeois economy, that it is clear from looking at it that is comes from a society where the process of production has the mastery of man rather than vice versa, and a final bit to say that nature has nothing to do with exchange value.
chapter 2:
- since commodities can't go to the market themselves, their owners must take them, and they in turn must recognise the other owners' rights as private proprietors. they exist for each other only as representatives of their respective commodities, and we'll find that those who appear on the economic stage are only the personification of the economic relations that exist between them (in other words, the book that follows won't read like an issue of class war).
- from the point of view of a commodity, any other commodity will do to express its value, but of course this is not so for the owner. for the owner, their own commodity's only use-value is that of being a depository of exchange value with which to obtain something of actual use-value - all commodities are non-use-values for their owners and use-values for their non-owners. to change hands and become use-values, commodities must first realise their value in the act of exchange. but first they must prove that they are use-values and whether the labour congealed in them is useful for others is only proved in exchange (i didn't really understand that bit).
- on one level, each owner only wants to exchange their commodity for one of use to themselves, so exchange is only a private matter. on the other hand they want to realise the value of their commodity regardless of whether or not it is of use to the new owner, which is purely social. for the owner their own commodity is the universal equivalent, but since this is true for every owner, there is no real universal equivalent, so products only confront each other as use-values. they can only come into relation as values (and so as commodities) by comparing to some other universal equivalent.
- he then repeats his account of the appearance of the money form, saying that at same rate products become commodities one special product becomes money. then comes an account of how things become commodities: first they are surplus articles to a communities needs exchanged on the boundaries, then as need for foreign products becomes established the constant competition of exchange establishes exchange as a normal social act until some portion of products are produced specifically for exchange. then proportion in which articles exchangable becomes dependant on production itself and we have values.
- in direct barter a commodity a means of exchange to the owner, an equivalent to others only insofar as it is a use-value for them so their value form is not yet independent of their use-value or the individual needs of exchanges. as the quantities of available commodities increase and are exchanged on a larger scale, a universal equivalent becomes necessary. to begin with it is temporary which commodity is the u.e. but it soon attaches itself to certain kinds: either the most important article of exchange from outside or to an object of utility that forms a large portion of indigenous wealth.
- as exchange expands further and value comes to embody abstract human labour, the money form attaches itself to commodities with physical properties suited to the functions of money. since money is the embodiment of abstract, undifferentiated, equal human labour, the material must have the same physical properties in every sample. since differences in value are purely quantative, the material must also be easily divisible and reunitable. gold and silver fit this rather nicely.
- the commodity chosen then has a twofold use-value: its normal use-value (gold for tooth fillings etc) and formal use-value of a specific social function. the money form is not an inseperable part of the object, just the form under which certain social relations manifest themselves and in this sense every commodity is a symbol as it is the material envelope of the human labour that created it. he then has a go at 18th century explanations of society for declaring that the material form assumed by the social qualities of labour under a definite mode of production are mere symbols implying that these characters are just arbitrary fictions sanctions by the so-called universal consent of mankind.
- the equivalent form does not imply the determinatin of a commodities value, so though gold may now be money we still don't know the value of gold since like every other commodity it can only express its value in other commodities, and its value is still determined by the amount of abstract human labour required to produce it. the quantitive determination of its value takes place at the point of production so by the time it is in circulation as money, this value is already a given. so despite appearances, gold becomes money because all other commodities express their values in it, commodities don't express their values in gold because it is money. gold and silver become the direct incarnation of all human labour.
- so in conclusion, in the form of society under examination the behaviour of men is purely atomic: relations to one another in production assume a material character independent of their control and conscious individual action. this manifests itself first in all products being commodities, then one commodity is stamped as money. the riddle of money then is just the most glaring form of the riddle of commodities.
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