Thank you for bringing this exchange onto the list.
Michael: Imo the work of petty commodity producers does not enter fully =
into the
abstract labour metric, because in the absence of the constraints of the
wage labour relation the reduction of concrete to abstract labour is
effected only indirectly via the sale of the output of such labour as a
commodity.
Brendan: But it's that "indirect" alienation that constitutes the labour =
as a commodity, something with use-value and exchange value.=20
Michael: Look at it the other way round: if producer co-operatives
became the dominant form of direct production relations, would we not =
need a
different model to adequately capture the dynamics of this new system?
Brendan: This point captures what I want to say. Yes, we would need a =
new model to capture the dynamics of that system. Our new model would =
be very like simple commodity production, if the division of labour =
between those co-operatives was still organised through the exchange of =
commodities.
Were that system feasible, the world on which it occurred would be very =
different from our own capitalist-dominated world. But commodity and =
hence value relations would be one thing the two planets had in common. =
Wouldn't commodities exchange at their values on Planet Proudhon?
I have no problem with arguments that abstract from the existence of =
simple commodity production when describing a capitalist economy. A =
model in which all production is undertaken by wage workers is useful =
for studying some central elements of the capitalist system. But by =
*defining* commodities to exclude those products made by non-wage labour =
you seem to prevent the application of value concepts to other =
commodities, like the products of petty production, or the commodity =
"labour-power." Why rule this out instead of just choosing to ignore it =
in a particular model?
It struck me that this could be relevant to one live issue: the extent =
to which actual price systems reflect values or prices of production =
based on profit equalisation.=20
The existence on the market of commodities not produced under direct =
capitalist relations of production would tend to reduce the bandwidth of =
the channel between prices of production and actual prices. If =
capitalist industry is factually and even institutionally excluded from =
(a monopoly of) the production of some commodities, then the mechanisms =
of capital mobility that are supposed to underly the formation of a =
single rate of profit via changes to prices can not apply to those =
commodities.=20
Brendan
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