Capitalism  + Industrialism  Commodification, Alienation

劉紀雯 1999/10/14 初稿         Marx in 1975; from MARX AND ENGELS ARCHIVE,PHOTO GALLERY

基本定義	商品：生產使用價值（Use value）以作交換． -- use value, exchange value, value and price:  price: 商品的價格（因供需而起伏）， exchange value: 商品和其他商品的對應交換關係（這裡重點並非以物易物，而是經由商品的比較，產生商品的社會關係和抽象價值．） value:  決定商品之間的交換價值． use value: 決定商品的價值． 資本：投資的金錢，目的是生產更多金錢（也就是錢滾錢）．
重要論點	資本主義的兩大影響：商品化、抽象化和Alienation I.  商品化 －－ 什麼是商品的價值？ 馬克斯 in Capital, Chap 1認為：商品的價值決定於它所需要的製作時間和技術(labor time)． Schmitt: other properties to consider: raw materials;  "The question for Marx was how the surface reality of the marketplace is connected with the deep reality of the social division of labor, or how the marketplace assigns who works where, and when, and how much.  The task is to connect the surface (the exchange of commodities) with the deep reality (the work that is done in the society to maintain it).  In the context of the Labor Theory of Value, that task takes the form of trying to clear up the relation between values and prices" (108).  馬克斯的商品價值論事實上指出了產品在變為商品的過程也是一個社會化和抽象化的過程：產品的使用價值需要是他人的使用價值；價值－不管是相對價值或是等同價值－也都是抽象的．（詳見引文） ＩＩ．資本主義的抽象化： 和以前社會所不同的是，資本主義社會是一個商品社會． 也就是價錢和利潤決定生產什麼商品，而商品決定人際關係． 換言之，商品的使用價值被交換價值所取代，商品關係就是社會關係． 因此，資本主義將人的空間資本化、抽象化．-- see 引文  abstraction of labor 演進至後工業資本主義，Jameson 看到社會上「全面性」的商品化．(overall commodification) ＩＩＩ．Alienation and Exploitation  商品／抽象化的過程中，勞工所經歷的就是剝削和孤離－－孤離於商品以及他自己的勞動力外．
議題：	商品的價值如何界定？exchange value, use value, symbolic value, etc.  資本主義的影響：對人的認同，社會關係和社會空間有何影響？

• Definition of value --  p. 129  "that which determines the magnitude of the value of any article is the amount of labour socially necessary, or the labour-time socially necessary for its production."

• exchange value defined: "first: the valid exchange-values of a given commodity express something equal; secondly, exchange-value, generally, is only the mode of expression, the phenomenal form, of something contained in it, yet distinguishable from it" (127)
• Marx's example: " e.g., 1 quarter corn = x cwt. iron. What does this equation tell us? It tells us that in two different things — in 1 quarter of corn and x cwt. of iron, there exists in equal quantities something common to both. The two things must therefore be equal to a third, which in itself is neither the one nor the other. Each of them, so far as it is exchange-value, must therefore be reducible to this third. "

abstraction & exchange value--quantity; and use value--quality: "the exchange of commodities is evidently an act characterised by a total abstraction from use-value. Then one use-value is just as good as another, provided only it be present in sufficient quantity.. . .  As use-values, commodities are, above all, of different qualities, but as exchange-values they are merely different quantities, and consequently do not contain an atom of use-value. " (127-28)
• use value, value, commodity with exchange value: "A thing can be a use-value, without having value. . . . [e.g. air, virgin soil, natural meadows, &c.]  A thing can be useful, and the product of human labour, without being a commodity. . .  . In order to produce the latter, he must not only produce use-values, but use-values for others, social use-values." (131)
• use value--two elements: "the material provided by nature and labour" (133)
 
• "The value of commodities is the very opposite of the coarse materiality of their bodies, not an atom of matter enters into it."
• "It is value, rather, that converts every product into a social hieroglyphic. Later on, we try to decipher the hieroglyphic, to get behind the secret of our own social products; for to stamp an object of utility as a value, is just as much a social product as language" (167)
• THE FORM OF VALUE: Relative form and Equivalent form

20 yards of linen = 1 coat, 20 yards of linen are worth 1 coat.
"The linen expresses its value in the coat; the coat serves as the material in which that value is expressed. The former plays an active, the latter a passive, part.  The value of the linen is represented as relative value, or appears in relative form. The coat  officiates as equivalent, or appears in equivalent form. " (139)
The relative  form of the value of the linen pre-supposes, therefore, the presence of some other commodity -- here the coat -- under the form of an equivalent. On the other hand, the commodity that figures as the equivalent cannot at the same time assume the relative form. That second commodity is not the one whose value is expressed. Its function is merely to serve as the
material in which the value of the first commodity is expressed. (140)
• changes of values:

"The relative value of a commodity may vary, although its value remains constant.
      Its relative value may remain constant, although its value varies; and finally, simultaneous
      variations in the magnitude of value and in that of its relative expression by no means
      necessarily correspond in amount."  (146)
• abstraction: equivalent form

"The natural form of the commodity becomes its value-form. But, mark well, that this substitution only occurs in the case of any commodity B, only when some other commodity A enters into a value-relation with it, and then only within the limits of this relation. Since no commodity can stand in the relation of equivalent to itself, and thus turn its own bodily shape into the expression of its own value, every commodity is compelled to choose some other commodity for its equivalent, and to accept the use-value, that is to say, the bodily shape of that other commodity as the form of its own value. (148)
• Since the relative form of value of a commodity -- the linen, for example-- expresses the

      value of that commodity, as being something wholly different from its substance and
      properties, as being, for instance, coat-like, we see that this expression itself indicates that
      some social relation lies at the bottom of it. With the equivalent form it is just the contrary.
      The very essence of this form is that the material commodity itself -- the coat -- just as it is,
      expresses value, and is endowed with the form of value by Nature itself. Of course this holds
      good only so long as the value-relation exists, in which the coat stands in the position of
      equivalent to the linen.
 
• Marx's conclusion: --the commodity's autonomy from use-values.  "Could commodities themselves speak, they would say: Our use-value may be a thing that interests men. It is no part of us as objects. What, however, does belong to us as objects, is our value. Our natural intercourse as commodities proves it. In the eyes of each other we are nothing but exchange-values" (176-77)

• Abstraction of labor

"The worker's activity, reduced to a mere abstraction of activity, is determined and
regulated on all sides by the movement of the machinery, and not the opposite. " (Grundrisse)

--  work not linked to specific individuals, done in exchange of money; becomes a commodity

alienation and exploitation:

"According to Marx alienation occurs in commodity production only.  Under such conditions the exchangerelations of market society separate production from consumption, and the product acquires a life of its own, independent of the producer, and comes to oppress him as an alien force.  Exploitation, on the other hand, is not confined to situation of commodity production. .  .The serf is exploited by the feudal lord, even though he produces only use-values.  . . . Exploitation, for Marx, is the appropriation of the surplus labour of one class by another class.  (Barbalet 95)

"The theory of alienation in Capital is derived from the labour theory of value and the concomitant theory of surplus value.

1. the value of all commodities, including labour power, is determined by the socially necessary labour time required for their production;
2. the worker is paid the full value of his labour power when he sells it to the capitalist;
3. that when the already purchased labour power is consumed in production by the capitalist it creates, in addition to its own value, a surplus value which constitutes a nett gain to the capitalist.   (Barbalet 97)
4. impoverishment of the working class ensues.

". . . in Capital the worker's alienation is a consequence of the sale of his labour-power to the capitalist, rather than a result of his labour -- in the form of a commodity -- being appropriated by the capitalist, as it is in the Manuscripts. . . . While individual's alienation is a consequence of commodity production, according to Capital, it is not the individual's own production of commodities which accounts for his alienation, for the individual labourer does not produce commodities.   The individual's alienation is located in the alienation of his labour power. (Barbalet 114)