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Fred, you're quite right to ask for this clarification in light of our
much-earlier discussion. For reasons given below I don't think it can
possibly affect the conclusion of my Ch. 5 critique, just the logical
status one accords to the alternative circuits of usury and merchant
capital in that critique. We'll see. You write:
>This is a question of clarification regarding Gil's (3079). Thanks, Gil.
>
>I am afraid that Gil's first sentence may gloss over a crucial
>disagreement between us, that I would like to clarify. I have argued
>that Marx's commodity in Chapter 1 is a product of CAPITALIST
>PRODUCTION. Gil responded that he agrees that Marx's commodity in Chapter
>1 is a product of the CAPITALIST MODE OF PRODUCTION.
>
>> I am certainly prepared to agree that Marx's starting point in Volume 1
>> is the commodity understood as a product of the "capitalist mode of
>> production," as per the first sentence in the 1st chapter.
>
>Now, one might think that there is no difference between "capitalist
>production" and the "capitalist mode of production." However, in previous
>OPEL discussions, Gil has given an unusual definition of the "capitalist
>mode of production," that includes NON-CAPITALIST forms of production
>(e.g. worker coops and the putting-out system).
For what it's worth: My distinction between "capitalist production" and
"capitalist mode of production" may be unusual, but I believe it's
textually grounded in Marx's own writing. For example, consider a passage
from Capital, V.III, where Marx argues that once the historical conditions
of the capitalist mode of production are reached, capitalists can't *go
back* to being simply usury capitalists (part of what I've called Marx's
"historical-strategic" analysis of the role of capitalist production in
capitalist exploitation):
"Concealed in this idea is the still greater nonsense...that the capitalist
mode of production could proceed on its course without capitalist
production." (p. 501, Penguin ed.)
(I challenge anyone on the list to make sense of that phrase if "the
capitalist mode of production" is taken as identical to "capitalist
production" *by definition.*)
On the basis of passages like this I interpret the capitalist mode of
production as a historical stage in which capitalists predominantly own the
means of production and workers are predominantly free "in the double
sense," but capitalists' *direct* control of production in the sense of at
least formal subsumption is a strategic variable rather than a defining
condition.
Thus, by this definition, capitalist production may be empirically
characteristic of the capitalist mode of production without being a
*necessary* feature of it.
[Thought experiment: if capitalists, in exercising their ownership rights
over alienable productive assets, were to forego direct control of the
labor process and yet somehow still achieve the same rates of exploitation,
would anyone be tempted to say that the resulting system were no longer
*capitalism*? Would Marx?]
I used the phrase "capitalist mode of production" in my response to Fred
because that's the phrase Marx uses in the first sentence of V. I. Given
the preceding, Fred is right to say this creates an ambiguity. Therefore,
for the sake of argument let me *assume* they're the same by definition,
and see where this leads us.
Fred continues:
> And Gil has argued that
>this broader definition is what Marx meant in the many passages throughout
>his manuscripts when he talks about the "capitalist mode of production."
>
>Gil, do continue to argue that this broader definition is what Marx meant
>by the "capitalist mode of production" throughout his manuscripts,
>especially when he says that his starting point in Chapter 1 is the
>"capitalist mode of production"? If so, then your first sentence is
>misleading, and I would like to review once again your textual evidence
>for this interpretation.
>
>Or, do you now agree that Marx's definition of the "capitalist mode of
>production" does not include these non-capitalist forms of production?
>In this case, my previous argument holds: your interpretation of Marx's
>"failure" in Chapter 5 cannot be correct. Since Marx was assuming
>capitalist production from the beginning, Marx could not have been
>attempting to derive capitalist production as the only possible way to
>produce surplus-value. And since Marx was not trying to prove that
>capitalist production is the only possible way to produce surplus-value,
>Marx could not have failed in such an attempt.
>Rather, Marx was trying to explain how surplus-value is produced WITHIN
>CAPITALISM (Marx's assumption from the beginning).
As indicated above, I'm choosing this horn of Fred's dilemma for the sake
of argument. That is, even if one were to equate by definition* capitalist
production and the capitalist mode of production, my critique of Ch. 5
would necessarily still hold: either Marx's argument is invalid, or else
it is in hindsight simply circular, such that Marx ends up concluding
exactly what he had assumed, and thus can be eliminated from the remainder
of his analysis without affecting its meaning. I say "in hindsight"
because Marx does not *define* what he means by the phrase "capitalist mode
of production" in that first sentence of Vol. I. It is thus necessarily an
*_ex post_* judgment what Marx was intending to take as given. I'm going
along with Fred's particular _ex post_ judgment in order to argue that it
doesn't obviate my critique of Marx's chapter 5 argument.
Fred: Let me start with your last statement above. If it's true that
"Marx was trying to explain how surplus-value is produced WITHIN
CAPITALISM," this is a statement about *sufficiency*, not *necessity.*
Under this interpretation, it is manifestly the case that no particular
assumption about the relationship of commodity prices and values is
required. Surplus value results if capitalists extract more labor from
workers than is embodied in their wage bundles. This holds *whether or
not* workers are paid exactly the value of their labor power, and also
*whether or not* all other commodities exchange at their respective values.
Consequently, on this interpretation, Marx's core argument in Ch. 5
(covering pp 262-267 in the Penguin edition) is *necessarily* and
*entirely* beside the point. So is his explicit conclusion that "the
transformation of money into capital *has to be developed* on the basis of
the immanent laws of the exchange of commodities, in such a way that the
starting point is the exchange of equivalents. The money owner...*must*
buy his commodities at their value, sell them at their value, and
yet...(etc). (pp. 268-9, emphases added).
The terms "has to be developed" and "must" are statements about
*necessity*, not *sufficiency*, as you suggest. Thus, under your
interpretation about what Marx is doing, Marx is not only making an entire
chapter of irrelevant arguments, but is also explicitly and fundamentally
confused about his own analytical mission!
The same thing can be said for his *deduction* at the beginning of Ch. 6,
in which he explicitly invokes the purchase and subsumption of labor power
as a logical *consequence* of the stipulation of price-value correspondence.
Now to your former statement:
>your interpretation of Marx's
>"failure" in Chapter 5 cannot be correct. Since Marx was assuming
>capitalist production from the beginning, Marx could not have been
>attempting to derive capitalist production as the only possible way to
>produce surplus-value. And since Marx was not trying to prove that
>capitalist production is the only possible way to produce surplus-value,
>Marx could not have failed in such an attempt.
>The fact that Marx assumed capitalist production from the beginning does
>not make Marx's argument in Chapter 5 "irrelevant", as Gil argues. I will
>return to this point in a subsequent post. Gil misunderstands what
>Chapter 5 is about. But first I would like to clarify just how Gil
>interprets Marx's definition of the "capitalist mode of production,"
>as the starting-point of his theory.
If we can agree a) that Marx intended to advance a logically coherent and
meaningful argument in Ch. 5 (and the beginning of Chapter 6) and that b) a
*non sequitur* is not logically coherent and a circular argument (one that
assumes its conclusion) is not meaningful, then my critique of Ch. 5 is
*necessarily* relevant, even under (perhaps *especially* under) your
interpretation of Marx's analytical mission. As the counter-examples of
usury and merchant capital extended to small producers help illustrate, the
*only* way to render Marx's chapter 5 arguments logically coherent is to
*assume* exactly the conditions that Marx *deduces* at the beginning of
Chapter 6. If Marx *assumes* universal capitalist production from the
get-go, it's true that these alternative circuits of capital are ruled out
by fiat. But invalid arguments can't be made valid simply by fiat.
As I mentioned in an earlier post, passages from Capital and Value Price
and Profit indicate that Marx thought it was *essential*, not just
illustrative or expedient, to begin from the condition of price-value
correspondence in explaining surplus value. And in hindsight, it's not
hard to see why: if we disregard this *necessity* aspect of Marx's
argument, as Fred seems to argue for, then there are no *analytical*
grounds for believing, by the end of V. I, part 2, that capitalist
production is anything more than an epiphenomenon of capitalist exploitation.
Gil
>Thanks in advance for your clarification. I look forward to further
>discussion.
>
>Comradely,
>Fred
>
>
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