Surplus Value

surplus profit capital

Workers are forced to enter class relations and to produce profit in order to su
rvive,
which enables capital to appropriate surplus.The notion of exploited surplus
value is the main concept of Marxs theory, by which he intends to show that
capitalism is a class society.The theory of surplus value is in consequence immed
iately
the theory of exploitation (Negri 1991, 74) and, one can add, the theory
of class and as a consequence the political demand for a classless society.
Enrique Dussel argues that in his work on the Grundrisse, Marx had for the first
time in his work [. . .] discovered the category of surplus value (Dussel 2008, 7
7)
in December 1857: if the worker needs only half a working day in order to
live a whole day, then, in order to keep alive as a worker, he needs to work onl
y
half a day. The second half of the day is forced labour; surplus labour (Marx
1857/1858b, 324). Surplus value means that workers are compelled to work more
than necessary for satisfying their immediate needs; they produce an excess for
free that is appropriated by capitalists: What appears as surplus value on capita
ls
side appears identically on the workers side as surplus labour in excess of his r
equirements
as worker, hence in excess of his immediate requirements for keeping
himself alive (ibid., 324325). The surplus value which capital obtains through
the production process consists only of the excess of surplus labour over necess
ary
labour.The increase in productive force can increase surplus labouri.e. the
excess of labour objectified in capital as product over the labour objectified i
n
the exchange value of the working dayonly to the extent that it diminishes
the relation of necessary labour to surplus labour, and only in the proportion i
n
which it diminishes this relation. Surplus value is exactly equal to surplus lab
our;
the increase of one [is] exactly measured by the diminution of necessary labour
(ibid., 339).
In Capital, Volume 1, Marx defines surplus value in the following way: The
capitalist wants to produce a commodity greater in value than the sum of the
values of the commodities used to produce it, namely the means of production
and the labour-power he purchased with his good money on the open market.
His aim is to produce not only a use-value, but a commodity; not only use-value,
but value; and not just value, but also surplus value [. . .] The cotton origina
lly
bought for 100 is for example re-sold at 100 + 10, i.e. 110.The complete
form of this process is therefore M-C-M, where M = M + 'M, i.e. the original
sum advanced plus an increment.This increment or excess over the original value
I
call surplus-value (Marx 1867c, 293, 251).
Capital is not money but money that is increased through accumulation,
money which begets money (ibid., 256). Marx argued that the value of labourpower
is the average amount of time that is needed for the production of goods
that are necessary for survival (necessary labour time), which in capitalism is
paid for by workers with their wages. Surplus labour time is all of labour time
that exceeds necessary labour time, remains unpaid, is appropriated for free by
capitalists and is transformed into money profit. Surplus value is in substance t
he
materialization of unpaid labour-time.The secret of the self-valorization of cap
ital
resolves itself into the fact that it has at its disposal a definite quantity of
the
unpaid labour of other people (ibid., 672). Surplus value costs the worker labour
but the capitalist nothing, but none the less becomes the legitimate property
of the capitalist (ibid.). Capital also developed into a coercive relation, and
this compels the working class to do more work than would be required by the
narrow circle of its own needs. As an agent in producing the activity of others,
as
an extractor of surplus labour and an exploiter of labour-power, it surpasses al
l
earlier systems of production, which were based on directly compulsory labour,
in its energy and its quality of unbounded and ruthless activity (ibid., 425).
workers by capitalists. This is the reason why he characterizes capital as vampi
re
and werewolf (ibid., 342, 411).
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!
2.4. Conclusion
!
For theorizing digital labour, a labour theory of value is needed. Based on Marxs
theory, we can distinguish between work and labour as anthropological and histor
ical
forms of human activity. This distinction is reflected in capitalism in the dual
character of the commodity that is both use-value and (exchange) value at the sa
me
time. The notion of alienated labour is grounded in a general model of the work
process that has been conceptualized based on a dialectic of subject and object
in
the economy that has been presented in the form of a model, the Hegelian-Marxist
dialectical triangle of the work process. This model is based on Hegels dialectic
of the subject and the object that Marx used for theorizing the labour process a
s
dialectical process.Various aspects of a Marxist theory of work and laboursuch as
the notions of abstract and concrete labour, double-free labour, productive labo
ur,
the collective worker and general workhave been presented.Work is a dialectical
interconnection of human subjects (labour-power) that use instruments on objects
so that products emerge that satisfy human needs. Labour is based on a fourfold
alienation of the human being from labour-power, the objects of labour and the
tools of labour as well as the results of labour. Alienation in capitalist socie
ties is
alienation of workers from all poles of this dialectic and from the whole proces
s
itself that constitutes class relations and exploitation.This chapter has also d
iscussed
Marxs concept of value by introducing the contemporary German debate on
Marxs labour theory of value (Michael Heinrich, Hans-Georg Backhaus, Helmut
Reichelt, Wolfgang Fritz Haug, Dieter Wolf, Robert Kurz). In a reconstruction of
Marxs labour theory of value, a Hegelian interpretation of the concepts of useval
ue,
value, exchange-value, money, price, the value and price of labour-power and
surplus value has been given. I have stressed the role of politics and class str
uggle
in the relationship of wages and prices and thereby argue, like Harry Cleaver an
d
Jacques Bidet, for a political interpretation of the value concept.Value is an o
bjective
concept determined by the amount of working hours needed on average for
the production of a commodity.The transition from the level of value to the leve
l
of commodity prices and the degree of profits is established in and through clas
s
struggle. This struggle is focused on the capitalist classs attempt to reduce wag
e
costs, that is, to make the proletariat work a larger part of the working day wi
thout
pay, and potential resistance against wage reductions and the intensification an
d extension
of work.The price of labour (wages) depends on the politically set working
conditions, which are the actual, temporal and dynamically changing result of th
e
class struggle between capital and labour. The purpose of chapter 2 was to set o
ut
foundations of Marxs labour theory of value as context for the discussion of digi
tal
labour. The next two chapters will focus on the academic context, namely on the
question how media and communication studies is positioning itself towards Marx
and Marxs topics.This is achieved by first having a look at Marx in Cultural Stud
ies
and then at contemporary discussions on the relevance of Dallas Smythes works.
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!
Notes
!
1 Als Bildnerin von Gebrauchswerten, als ntzliche Arbeit, ist die Arbeit daher ein
e
von allen Gesellschaftsformen unabhngige Existenzbedingung des Menschen, ewige
Naturnotwendigkeit, um den Stoffwechsel zwischen Mensch und Natur, also das mens
chliche
Leben zu vermitteln (MEW 23, 192).
2 Das Reich der Freiheit beginnt in der Tat erst da, wo das Arbeiten, das durch N
ot und
uere Zweckmigkeit bestimmt ist, aufhrt; es liegt also der Natur der Sache nach
jenseits der Sphre der eigentlichen materiellen Produktion (MEW 25, 828).
3 I have provided here my own translation because the English translation of Aufh
eben
dieses Aufhebens (Marx 1857/1858a, 222) as suspension of this suspension (Marx
1857/1858b, 301) does not capture the Hegelian-dialectical meaning of the term A
ufhebung
that is correctly translated with the term sublation.
4 Allseitigkeit ihrer Entwicklung has here been translated as multiplicity of its d
evelopment.
But in order to be consistent with the terminology in The German Ideology,
a more adequate translation would be to speak of the well-roundedness of its [soc
ietys]
development.
5 Das Reich der Freiheit beginnt in der Tat erst da, wo das Arbeiten, das durch N
ot und
uere Zweckmigkeit bestimmt ist, aufhrt; es liegt also der Natur der Sache nach
jenseits der Sphre der eigentlichen materiellen Produktion (MEW 25, 828).
6 Ihre Wertgegenstndlichkeit existiert nur als gemeinsame Wertgegenstndlichkeit im
Austausch, und der allseitige Austausch von Waren (im Unterschied zum Tausch ver
einzelter
Produkte) existiert nur als Bezug der Waren auf Geld.
7 [. . .] ist Geld als Wertma nicht einfach eine formale bersetzung eines immanente
n
Wertmaes, welches die Wertgre bereits gemessen hat. Es ist vielmehr die notwendige
und vor allem einzig mgliche Erscheinungsform des Warenwerts, eine vom Tausch
unabhngige Erscheinungsform des Werts kann es nicht geben.
8 Erst innerhalb des Austausches verwandelt sich die Privatarbeit wirklich in ges
ellschaftliche
Arbeit, wird sie zu wertbildender Arbeit. Dann folgt aber auch, wovon
bereits oben die Rede war, da den Waren erst innerhalb des Austausches Wert und
Wertgre zukommt.
9 Es ist, als fnde eine Urzeugung der Warencharaktere im Moment des Verkaufs statt.
10 Die wertformanalytische Geldtheorie von Marx wird in eine geldtheoretische (mon
etre)
Werttheorie verkehrt; dem dialektischen Totalittsdenken wird die Geschichte
ausgetrieben.