EXAM 2
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WeekSevenPPT.pptxMarx & Engels
Development of INR – Week 7
Karl Marx
Karl Marx (1818-1883): if Kant was one of the foremost human thinkers historically, Marx was probably the most influential one over the next two centuries.
Revolutionized the understanding of political economy of capitalism.
Defined the core element of capitalism as capital accumulation and the production of surplus value (excess value over labor power).
Devised historical materialism (recall Hegel):
the idea that historical transformation happens as a result of tensions (i.e. contradictions) with regards to (material) productive power.
History is the class struggle.
Example: transition from Feudalism to Capitalism.
conflict between merchant class and aristocracy.
Social revolution is a function of the lack of productive outlets for surplus capital.
Theoretical Vocation (Wolin)
What is the purpose of theory?
Scientific inquiry assumes a detachment from the world.
Political theoretical inquiry also assumes a certain detachment from the political world.
The importance of thought as contemplation.
Marx: “The question of whether objective truth can be attributed to human thinking is not a question of theory but is a practical question. Man must prove the truth, i.e. the reality and power, the this-sidedness of his thinking in practice…The philosophers have only interpreted the world in various ways; the point is to change it” (409).
Dedicated to overthrowing capitalist system.
Goal not just to uncover the exploitative of capital but the vocation of thinking is to engage in the practical (praxis) pursuit of change.
Marx on Capitalism: Fourth Stage of History
Emergence of the Market Economy.
Marx explicitly ties this with the discovery and exploitation of the new world.
Introduction of gold and silver gave enormous impetus for the development of a merchant class that challenged the authority of the landed nobility.
Codification of Private Property.
Essential for the establishment of a commercial society and the accumulation of capital.
A mechanism for asserting a sharper restraint on state power (Locke).
Dominance of the Profit Motive.
Transformation in the social consciousness of individuals.
Democracy.
Revolutionary moments in the 18th century become part of the establishment of constitutional restraints to political power.
Wage Labor and the emergence of the Proletariat.
Rise of industrial capitalism and its necessity of having a cheap reserve labor pool.
Imperialism
Necessity of opening new markets for the production and distribution of goods and services.
Capitalism
A specific mode of production.
Use value vs. Exchange Value;
The utility of a product that is consumed vs. exchanged.
How is surplus value (i.e. the difference between use and exchange value; the return on invested capital) created?
Marx: through the exploitation of labor power.
Explosion of wealth in 19th century. Why?
Marx: the way labor was organized and used.
Labor produces surplus value.
Labor is alienated from what is produced: no access to the means of production.
Alienation
Capitalism alienates us from:
From our own labor
We do not decide what to produce, and we don’t use or own what we make
Labor becomes a burden, something we must do to survive
We no longer engage in creative labor; work becomes mechanical and inhuman
From other workers
We view other workers as competitors for jobs and good wages
Obscures the common interests we share in improving working conditions
From society and the world
We come to view interactions with other solely in terms of market relations
We view the world in terms of commodities; value is tied to the market
Natural world is valuable only in so far as it increases profit
Production for the market rather than in response to human need has the perverse result of producing its own scarcity
Scarcity comes form over-production rather than under-production
After Capitalism?
Marx & Engles: The Communist Manifesto
Human Emancipation from the confines of capital exploitation (not just about property).
“A spectre is haunting Europe—the spectre of communism. All the powers of old Europe have entered into a holy alliance to exorcise this spectre.”
“The history of all hitherto existing society is the history of class struggle.”
