Marx and the Meaning of Capitalism: Introduction and Analyses

212 Pages·2008·1.81 MB·English

by  Stanley Bober (auth.)

Marx and the Meaning of Capitalism

Marx and the Meaning
of Capitalism
Introduction and Analyses
Stanley Bober
MARXANDTHEMEANINGOFCAPITALISM
Copyright © Stanley Bober,2008.
Softcover reprint of the hardcover 1st edition 2008 978-0-230-60679-1
All rights reserved.
First published in 2008 by
PALGRAVE MACMILLAN®
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this is by Palgrave Macmillan,a division of Macmillan Publishers Limited,
registered in England,company number 785998,of Houndmills,
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Palgrave Macmillan is the global academic imprint of the above companies
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ISBN 978-1-349-60342-8 ISBN 978-0-230-61371-3 (eBook)
DOI 10.1057/9780230613713
Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data
Bober,Stanley.
Marx and the meaning of capitalism :introduction and analyses /
by Stanley Bober.
p.cm.
1.Marxian economics.2.Capitalism.I.Title.
HB97.5.B538 2008
335.4(cid:7)12––dc22 2007050114
A catalogue record for this book is available from the British Library.
Design by Newgen Imaging Systems (P) Ltd.,Chennai,India.
First edition:July 2008
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Transferred to Digital Printing 2009
To Sharon and Mitchell,my constant sources ofinspiration.

Contents
Preface ix
Acknowledgment xi
1 The Philosophy 1
2 The Basic Design 15
3 Value and Transformation 33
4 Critical Observations 57
5 Rebuttal and Defense 83
6 Crises in Capitalism 139
7 End Thoughts and Marxian Relevancy 177
Notes 187
Bibliography 197
Index 201

Preface
This book undertakes a study of the economics of Karl Marx because
his analysis imparts to us an essential truth,or ideological imprint,
about capitalism as a social and productive structure. It is that Marx
exposes and opens up an understanding ofsocial class relationships in the
economic sphere ofcapitalist society;and how the workings ofthis class
arrangement impacts on people’s lives in terms of income,employment,
and working practices.An analysis of“Marxism”would have us discover
not only how capitalism works,but to learn what capitalism is.And what
it is forms the basis for what it does (and how),which is being a very suc-
cessful mechanism in the creation of wealth in the form of a myriad of
commodities. This is what is obviously visible, and paraded as to what
capitalism is.But commodities as goods that are produced in a particular
“social”environment are not only things that contain use-characteristics,
that is,in Marxian terms “use-values”;but they are things that by the very
act of their production contain unseen relationships between classes of
people.This connection or relationship,which is central to Marx,is given
visibility by his analysis of the concept of “labor value” inherent in a
commodity.
What capitalism means,is an historically specific form of binding or
relating classes of people within a production process thereby creating a
quantity of labor value;and by its very nature this relationship is one of
antagonism and conflict,the outcome of which reveals the visible attrib-
utes ofeconomic life such as prices,profits,and wages.As we will come to
understand,these attributes that appear through the superficiality ofmar-
ket outcomes are in reality manifested by the unseen underlying quantity
oflabor value;that is,by the social relations in production.Marx asks us to
comprehend the workings of the economy through two related planes of
analysis.
What capitalism is today (in its basic attributes) is no different than
what we would mean by capitalism in Marx’s time,during the heyday of
the industrial revolution with its Dickinsonian poverty of the working
class and “rapacious” laboring conditions. But in the intervening years