Subject: [OPE-L:1750] Re: Re: Re: value form
From: Allin Cottrell (cottrell@ricardo.ecn.wfu.edu)
Date: Fri Nov 26 1999 - 11:54:57 EST
On Fri, 26 Nov 1999 coslap@aueb.gr wrote:
> MY POINT WAS THAT ABSTRACT LABOUR IS THE FORM NECESSARILY
> TAKEN BY SOCIAL LABOUR IN CAPITALISM. WHAT I WAS ASKING WAS,
> IF SOCIAL LABOUR COULD EXIST DIRECTLY, WHY USE THE CONCEPT
> OF ABSTRACT LABOUR?
I think that Paul's point, with which I agree, is that the
concrete/abstract and private/social distinctions are
orthogonal. Robinson's private labour takes a variety of
concrete forms, but these concrete forms may be considered as
particular dispositions of his total available (abstract)
labour. The same goes for the social labour time in a planned
economy.
I suppose that "social labour" means labour that is not directed
towards the satisfaction of the individual needs of the person
performing the labour, but rather forms part of a social
division of labour (planned or unplanned). I think that what is
special about capitalism is not that "abstract labour is the
form necessarily taken by social labour" (social labour is
always both abstract and concrete) but that the social character
of labour is only "validated" ex post, via the market, and that
quanta of abstract labour are not calculated and represented as
such, but are rather represented by quanta of money.
Allin Cottrell.
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