On Fri, 17 Jul 1998, Alejandro Rivero wrote:
> Still, I'd like to hear more about this issue of "surplus labour as
> origin of capital accumulation", even after reading the long posting
> from Andy, it seems to me a combination of two mistakes.
Only the most simple of instruments of production can cause themselves -
supposing a stick fallen from a tree or a jaw-bone left by the rotting ass
- and even then a person must walk over and pick it up. Gold cannot dig
itself from the ground, nor pan and sift itself from the river. Nature
cannot by herself produce a predictable abundance of wild grains to
support a large population; and her abundance of roots and berries must be
dug, picked or collected. Even the most advanced self-maintaining robot
must ultimately be built by human hands using tools built by human hands,
using technical knowledge thought out by human brains. The substance these
diverse activities have in common is this: human activity.
Only when such activity produces more than it consumes does surplus arise.
But this surplus enjoys no special origin over an above the same origin
that its means enjoy. So if capital is accumulated, what must be
accumulated is surplus labor. Capital laying there without people taking
it up and animating it, even if this taking up is only a man pushing a
button in the morning in an automated factory, produces no surplus, nor
can it pay for itself, and thus, at the end of the day, there is nothing
produced to potentially accumulate. What is not produced is surplus labor,
since without labor, necessary or surplus, nothing happens.
> Actually, I can imagine systems where additional labour drives the owner
> to benefit loss, due to the offer/demand mechanism.
Sure, I can too. But I think that you have here committed a logical error.
Because the ultimate source of accumulated capital is surplus labor does
not mean that all surplus labor is accumulated capital. A necessary
component to sustaining my life is food intake, but this does not mean
that all the food I eat is necessary to sustain my life, and some things I
put into my stomach may even be bad for me.
> So "surplus" labour, if it exists, is different of additional labour.
> Similarly, I can imagine porcess where an actual decrease of labour time
> would increment owner benefits, so "surplus" labour could be less
> labour!
Yes, a decrease of labor time in absolute terms may benefit the owner,
e.g., by raising the productivity of labor. But this does not mean that
the surplus that is produced, appropriated, and accumulated has its source
in something other than human labor. If I am working in a field digging
holes for planting by hand, and I think of using a pointed stick for
carrying out this task, and so I am finished planting in less time with
less effort, the crop which is harvested at the end, if there is a
surplus, is no less a product of my laboring with the stick in half the
time it took in my laboring with my fingernails. Add to this example
levels of complexity (in division of labor, technology, so on) and you
will find the same principle holds.
> As for capital accumulation, while I can imagine such concept, the use
> given in Andy post sounds, so to say, as "flogisto theory". I can not
> see why the interaction of capital with itself is forbidden to produce
> additional capital. If the argument is about conservation laws, the only
> one Nature accepts is energy, and well, capital can stole energy from a
> variety of sources, human work being only one of them.
Capital interacting with itself does produce more capital. This is the
reason we talk in terms of self-expansion. But there must be different
sorts of capital at work, namely, the mix of fixed and variable capital,
for capital to expand. It is in the variable capital invested that more
(surplus) can be produced than was invested.
As for the last assertion regarding the sources of energy, there are
several problem. First, energy that is harnessed in production must be, in
all but a few cases (such as the sun in planting - but then one must not
plant in the shade), harnessed by human labor. Second, other sources of
energy do not form a social class. A geyser is not exploited; human labor
is. It is the surplus from human labor that permits the existence of
social classes and strata who do not labor and produce surplus.
Third, for purposes of accumulating capital in the capitalist system,
where human labor becomes a source of surplus-*value*, capital must be
circulated to expand. We have here focused only on production; but it also
is the case that without consumers with money in their pockets to buy the
commodities produced by workers then there is no motive to produce
commodities for a profit. And consumers are also often workers. Suppose
that we could eliminate human labor altogether; this would at once
eliminate consumers altogether, and the system would be transformed
altogether: capitalism could not be possible. Geysers and oil pits and the
wind cannot act as consumers in the market. They cannot complete the
circulation process for capital to accumulate. Without workers, who are at
the same time consumers, then capitalism cannot reproduce itself,
dependent as it is on the production of surplus-value. The process of
surplus production begins and terminates in human labor - only at the
point of production workers produce more than they need so that somebody
who does not produce can enjoy privilege and power over them.
Btw, what were the two mistakes you thought I made?
Thanks,
Andy