Seventeen Contradictions and the End of Capitalism by David Harvey Page A
Authors: David Harvey
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The inner relation between capitalist class power and these fictions and fetishisms is nowhere more evident than in the crucial commodification, monetisation and privatisation of labour power and it is to this that we must now turn.
Contradiction 5
Capital and Labour
That some human beings have appropriated and exploited the labour power of others has been a long-standing feature of human organisation. The exercise of the power to do so has entailed the construction of different social relations, from the coercions of slavery, serfdom and the trading of women (and sometimes children) as mere chattels to the willing consent of worshippers to do God’s or the gods’ work in theocratic societies or the submissive fealty of loyal subjects to go to war or to mobilise to build, say, pyramids, in the name of a revered leader, patriarch, monarch or local lord. That such social relations of domination, appropriation and exploitation could be racialised, ethnicised, gendered and targeted at culturally, religiously affiliated or supposedly biologically inferior beings has also been a long-standing practice. That they could be monetised and commodified is obvious. Slaves could be bought and sold directly, dowries (measured in key commodities like cattle or money) were attached to the trade in women, and mercenary armies displaced those in which religious beliefs and personal loyalties were what counted. In addition, being mired in escalating debts (debt peonage or some parallel form such as share-cropping) was, and continues to be, one of the more insidious ways in which either the labour or the products of the labour of others get appropriated by those with social, political and money power.
But what capital deals in, and this is what makes this mode of production distinctive, is labour power as a commodity. The labourer is the bearer of that commodity and sells it to the capitalist in a supposedly ‘free’ labour market. Trading in labour services preceded the rise of capitalism, of course, and it is entirely possiblethat such trading will continue long after capital has ceased to exist as a viable way to produce and consume. But what capital learned was that it could create the basis for its own reproduction – hopefully on a permanent basis – through the systemic and continuous use of labour power to produce a surplus over that which the labourer needed to survive at a given standard of living. This surplus lies at the root of monetary profit.
The remarkable thing about this system is that it does not appear to rely on cheating, theft, robbery or dispossession because labourers can be paid their ‘fair’ market value (the ‘going rate’) at the same time as they can be put to work to generate the surplus value that capital needs to survive. This ‘fairness’ rests on the conceit that labourers have an individualised private property right over the labour power they are capable of furnishing to capital as a commodity (a commodity which has the use value to capital of being able to produce value and surplus value) and that they are ‘free’ to dispose of that labour power to whomsoever they like. It is most convenient for capital, of course, that labourers be ‘freed’ of any access to the land or even to any means of production. They then have no option except to sell their labour power in order to live. When put to work, capitalists can see to it that labourers produce more in commodity values than the market value of their labour power. Labourers, in short, must add more value than they get if capital is to be created and reproduced. Capital pockets the added value as profit and can store that added value as an ever-increasing concentration of money power.
The commodification of labour power is the only way to solve a seemingly intractable contradiction within the circulation of capital. In a properly functioning market system, where coercion, cheating and robbery are ruled out, the exchanges should be based on
Contradiction 5
Capital and Labour
That some human beings have appropriated and exploited the labour power of others has been a long-standing feature of human organisation. The exercise of the power to do so has entailed the construction of different social relations, from the coercions of slavery, serfdom and the trading of women (and sometimes children) as mere chattels to the willing consent of worshippers to do God’s or the gods’ work in theocratic societies or the submissive fealty of loyal subjects to go to war or to mobilise to build, say, pyramids, in the name of a revered leader, patriarch, monarch or local lord. That such social relations of domination, appropriation and exploitation could be racialised, ethnicised, gendered and targeted at culturally, religiously affiliated or supposedly biologically inferior beings has also been a long-standing practice. That they could be monetised and commodified is obvious. Slaves could be bought and sold directly, dowries (measured in key commodities like cattle or money) were attached to the trade in women, and mercenary armies displaced those in which religious beliefs and personal loyalties were what counted. In addition, being mired in escalating debts (debt peonage or some parallel form such as share-cropping) was, and continues to be, one of the more insidious ways in which either the labour or the products of the labour of others get appropriated by those with social, political and money power.
But what capital deals in, and this is what makes this mode of production distinctive, is labour power as a commodity. The labourer is the bearer of that commodity and sells it to the capitalist in a supposedly ‘free’ labour market. Trading in labour services preceded the rise of capitalism, of course, and it is entirely possiblethat such trading will continue long after capital has ceased to exist as a viable way to produce and consume. But what capital learned was that it could create the basis for its own reproduction – hopefully on a permanent basis – through the systemic and continuous use of labour power to produce a surplus over that which the labourer needed to survive at a given standard of living. This surplus lies at the root of monetary profit.
The remarkable thing about this system is that it does not appear to rely on cheating, theft, robbery or dispossession because labourers can be paid their ‘fair’ market value (the ‘going rate’) at the same time as they can be put to work to generate the surplus value that capital needs to survive. This ‘fairness’ rests on the conceit that labourers have an individualised private property right over the labour power they are capable of furnishing to capital as a commodity (a commodity which has the use value to capital of being able to produce value and surplus value) and that they are ‘free’ to dispose of that labour power to whomsoever they like. It is most convenient for capital, of course, that labourers be ‘freed’ of any access to the land or even to any means of production. They then have no option except to sell their labour power in order to live. When put to work, capitalists can see to it that labourers produce more in commodity values than the market value of their labour power. Labourers, in short, must add more value than they get if capital is to be created and reproduced. Capital pockets the added value as profit and can store that added value as an ever-increasing concentration of money power.
The commodification of labour power is the only way to solve a seemingly intractable contradiction within the circulation of capital. In a properly functioning market system, where coercion, cheating and robbery are ruled out, the exchanges should be based on
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