This is a response to Alan's (2088), which was a response to my (2068).
Thanks to Alan for his comments.
The main point of disagreement between Alan and me is that I argue that the
subject of 'Capital' from the very beginning in Chapter 1 is "capitalist
production" or the "capitalist mode of production" and Alan argues to the
contrary that the subject of Chapter 1-5 is a "general commodity" which
could also be the product of non-capitalist modes of production and only in
Chapter 6 does the subject become the capitalist mode of production
specifically.
Aside from all the textual evidence I have presented (to be discussed again
below), the main methodological reasons why I think that the commodity
analyzed in Chapter 1 is a product specifically and solely of capitalist
production are the following:
(1) Marx's logical method includes the Hegelian notion of TOTALITY. Marx's
theory from beginning to end is about the totality of capitalist production.
Marx's theory attempts to demonstrate the necessary interconnections between
the various features of this totality and to derive the laws of motion over
time of this totality. Marx's theory begins with the most abstract,
universal feature of this totality of capitalist production - the fact that
its product is a commodity. Thus the commodity analyzed in Chapter 1 is the
"elementary premise" or the precondition of capitalist production.
According to this interpretation, the commodity in Chapter 1 cannot be a
"general commodity" because then it would no longer be an abstraction from
the specific totality of capitalist production, but would instead be an
abstraction from a mixture of modes of production. Mike W. made a similar
point I believe in (2105).
(2) The main question analyzed in Volume 1 of 'Capital' is the determination
of the total amount of surplus-value produced in the capitalist economy as a
whole. In order to analyze surplus-value, Marx must first introduce his
theory of value in capitalism which he does by means of an analysis of the
commodity in capitalism. There is no need for Marx to analyze "commodities
in general" including commodities produced in non-capitalist modes of
production, because these latter commodities have no bearing on Marx's
theory of the surplus-value produced in capitalism. Why would Marx analyze
"commodities in general"? In order to prove that labor-power is the only
source of surplus-value (i.e. that capitalist production is the only way to
produce surplus-value)? I don't think so. That was not Marx's question in
Volume 1. The question was surplus-value in capitalism (more on this below).
(3) Another Hegelian aspect of Marx's theory is that it attempts to
demonstrate that the totality of capitalist production REPRODUCES HIS OWN
PREMISES. The commodity that was initially analyzed in Chapter 1 as the
"elementary premise" of capitalist production is analyzed as the end of
Volume 1 as a specific product of capitalist production. (Similar arguments
are made about the other key preconditions of capitalist production, money
and labor-power.) This is the main point of the first section of the
"Results" manuscript entitled "Commodities as Product of Capital". In order
for Marx's theory to demonstrate that the premises of capitalist production
are reproduced by it, the commodity in Chapter 1 must be taken as the
premise of capitalist production. A few passages from this section which
indicate the "circular", or symmetrical, nature of Marx's argument include
the following (all emphases are Marx's):
As the elementary form of bourgeois wealth, the *commodity* was our
point of departure, the prerequisite for the emergence of capital. On the
other hand, *commodities* appear now as the *product of capital*.
(C.I, p. 949)
If we consider societies where *capitalist production* is *highly
developed*, we find that the commodity is both the constant elementary
premiss (precondition) of capital and also the immediate result of the
capitalist process of production. (p. 949)
Hence if the *commodity* appears on the one hand as the premiss of the
formation of capital, it is also essentially the result, the product of
capitalist production once it has become the *universal elementary form of
the product* (p. 950)
This "circular" aspect of Marx's method is also discussed in one of the
other passages I have previously quoted from TSV.
We start from the *commodity*, this specific social form of the product,
as the foundation and prerequisite of capitalist production. ... [T]he
*prerequisite*, the *starting-point*, of the formation of capital and the
capitalist mode of production is the development of the product of the
product into a commodity ... It is as such a prerequisite that we treat
`the commodity, since we proceed from it as the simplest element of
capitalist production. On the other hand, the product, the result of
capitalist production, is the commodity. What appears as the element is
later revealed to be its own product. (TSV.III. 112)
(4) A good reference on these Hegalian aspects of Marx's logical method - (1)
and (3) above - is Jairus Banaji, "From the Commodity to Capital: Hegel's
Dialectic in Marx's 'Capital'," in Diane Elson (ed). 'Value: The
Representation of Social Labor.'
2. For further textual evidence, I presented in a previous post (#2068) 7
passages from the various drafts of 'Capital' that explicitly stated that
the commodity analyzed in Chapter 1 is the product of "capitalist
production". Alan argues that all 7 of these passages are from earlier
drafts of 'Capital' and not from the final version of Volume 1. Hence, Alan
argues, these passages prove the opposite of what I argue - they prove that
Marx "painstakingly purged" all such statements in the final version of
Volume 1, thus indicating that Marx changed his mind about the nature of the
commodity in Chapter 1. The commodity was no longer analyzed as the product
of capitalist production, but rather as a general commodity which could also
be the product of other modes of production.
I argue in response that, first of all, the first sentence of the final
version of Chapter 1 states that the commodity being analyzed is the product
of the "capitalist mode of production". I have argued in previous posts
that the "capitalist mode of production" is synonomous with "capitalist
production". But even if this is not accepted, the "capitalist mode of
production" is more restricted that a "general commodity". For example,
"simple commodity production" is included in the latter, but not in the
former. "Capitalist mode of production" implies at least the separation of
workers from the means of production. Therefore, Alan must be wrong. The
commodity in Chapter 1 is the product of the "capitalist mode of
production", which is not "general commodity production".
Furthermore, the absence of explicit further references to the commodity as
the product of "capitalist production" in the final version of Chapter 1
does not necessarily imply that Marx changed him mind about the nature of
the commodity in Chapter 1, for several additional reasons, besides the
first sentence. Firstly, Marx never said explicity that he changed his
mind. Given the methodological importance of this point, one would expect
at least some discussion of this change of mind, but there is none.
Secondly, the actual argument in Chapter 1 of Volume 1 is essentially the
same as in the 'Critique of Political Economy', written 10 years before.
Most of the references to the effect that the commodity in Chapter 1 is the
product of capitalist production are from the drafts written between the
'Critique' and 'Capital'. If Marx had changed his mind about this important
point, one would expect some relevant differences in the nature of the
argument in Chapter 1, but there are none. There are also no explicit
statements in the 'Critique' that the commodity is the product of capitalist
production, except the first sentence which states (as in 'Capital') that
the commodity being analyzed is the product of "bourgeois society". But the
existence of such statements in the later manuscripts suggests that, even
though it was not further explicitly stated, the commodity in the first
chapter of the 'Critique' is the product of capitalist production. The same
thing is true of the commodity in Chapter 1 of 'Capital'. In general, there
are fewer explicit methodological statements in these works prepared for
publication than in the working manuscripts. Finally, one of the 7 passages
that I cited is from one of the Volume 2 manuscripts which was written in
the 1878, very late in Marx's life and after the final version of Volume 1
(C.II, p. 465). This passage is a comment on Smith's analysis of the
commodity. Marx remarks that the commodity in Smith's theory is
commodity-capital, or the product of capitalist production. However, Marx
argued, Smith's analysis of the commodity and its value "directly coincides"
with his analysis of surplus-value, which is an incorrect logical procedure.
The analysis of value should proceed the analysis of surplus-value.
Therefore, Smith's theory should have begun with a prior analysis of the
commodity in capitalist production and its value. This I argue is Marx's
logical method in Volume 1. The fact that this passage was written after
the completion of the final version of Volume 1 indicates that this was
still Marx's thinking on the nature of the commodity in Chapter 1 in the
final version of Volume 1.
3. The main positive evidence that Alan provides that the commodity
analyzed in Chapter 1 is not necessarily the product of capitalist
production, but is rather a "general commodity", is a passage from Chapter 6
of Volume 1 of 'Capital' (p. 273). This passage is worth repeating:
Had we gone further, and inquired under what circumstances all, or even
the majority of products take the form of commodities, we should have
found that this only happens on the basis of one particular mode of
production, the capitalist one. Such an investigation, however, *would
have been foreign to the analysis of commodities*. (Alan's emphasis)
Alan argues that the phrase "would have been foreign to an analysis of the
commodity" means that the mode of production of which the commodity is a
product is not specified; rather the commodity is "general" and could apply
to various modes of production.
It is very interesting to compare this passage with the earlier draft of
this passge in the 1861-63 manuscript (MECW, v. 30, pp. 38-39). This
earlier draft says essentially the same thing as the later Volume 1 version.
The above passage from Volume 1 is as follows:
If we had pursued the question further, asking under what circumstances
the products are generally produced as commodities, ... it would have
turned historical mode of production, the capitalist one. But this way of
looking at things would not have been relevant to the analysis of the
commodity as such, for in that analysis we were only concerned with the
products, the use values, to the extent that they appeared in the commodity
form, and not with the question of the socio-economic basis for the
appearance of every product as a commodity.
However, this passage is preceeded with the following methodological comment:
We started out from the way the commodity appears on the surface of
bourgeios society, as the simplest economic relation, the element of
bourgeois wealth.
and is followed by a similar methodological comment:
We were proceeding instead from the fact that the commodity is found to be
present in bourgeois production as such a universal elementary form of
wealth.
Therefore, in the 1861-63 draft it seems clear that: (1) the commodity in
Chapter 1 is abstracted from capitalist production, i.e. is the product of
capitalist production; and at the same time (2) the analysis of the
commodity in Chapter 1 is not concerned with the question of under what mode
of production the commodity becomes the general form of the product. In
general, the analysis of the commodity is not concerned with he sphere of
production. Production is "abstracted" from at this stage of analysis. The
analysis is concerned only with the "abstract sphere of circulation" of the
capitalist mode of production. Alan is right that the analysis of the
commodity is not concerned with production. But this abstraction does not
mean that the commodity could be the product of various modes of production.
The commodity analyzed in Chapter 1 is abstracted from the totality of the
capitalist mode of production.
This interpretation also applies to the final version even though the
explicit methodological statements are omitted. Marx did not change his
mind about the nature of the commodity in Chapter 1. He simply omitted the
explicit methodological references.
4. WHAT DIFFERENCE DOES IT MAKE? For Alan, if the commodity is taken to be
the product of capitalist production, then Marx is guilty of "assuming what
is to be proved." "What is to be proved" is evidently that "surplus-value
can arise only on the basis of labor-power," i.e. that no other form of
labor produces surplus-value. Thus, Alan agrees with Gil on this point:
Marx is trying to argue in Chapters 5 and 6 that labor-power is the only
source of surplus-value. They disagree of course (strongly) about whether
or not Marx succeeded in this attempt.
I argue, to the contrary, that this is not what Marx was trying to prove in
Chapters 5 and 6. This was not Marx's question. As I argued in a recent
response to Gil, what Marx was trying to prove is that WITHIN CAPITALIST
PRODUCTION (which is assumed from the beginning), labor-power is the only
possible source of surplus-value, i.e. that labor-power is the necessary
condition for the existence of surplus-value in capitalism. Therefore,
assuming capitalism from the beginning does not "assume what is to be
proved." Rather, it establishes what is to be proved: the necessary
connections between the important features and phenomena of this assumed
totality of capitalist production.
In solidarity,
Fred