Wow this is going great. The hard part is over, and now we have hit a stride. We have learned Karl Marx's theory of money, and of trade. We have learned what capital is and how it differs from money.

If you've made it this far, you've done the hardest part. Several people noticed it is getting easy and fun now. All the same, don't let up til we reach our destination.

Please be chatty in the comments. Let us know you're here.

The overall plan is to read Volumes 1, 2, and 3 in one year. (Volume IV, often published under the title Theories of Surplus Value, will not be included in this particular reading club, but comrades are encouraged to do other solo and collaborative reading.) This bookclub will repeat yearly. The three volumes in a year works out to about 6½ pages a day for a year, 46⅔ pages a week.

I'll post the readings at the start of each week and @mention anybody interested. Let me know if you want to be added or removed.

Just joining us? It'll take you about seven hours to catch up to where the group is.

Archives: Week 1 – Week 2 – Week 3

Week 4, Jan 22-28, we are reading Volume 1, Chapter 6, Chapter 7, and Chapter 8

Discuss the week's reading in the comments.

Use any translation/edition you like. Marxists.org has the Moore and Aveling translation in various file formats including epub and PDF: https://www.marxists.org/archive/marx/works/1867-c1/

Ben Fowkes translation, PDF: http://libgen.is/book/index.php?md5=9C4A100BD61BB2DB9BE26773E4DBC5D

AernaLingus says: I noticed that the linked copy of the Fowkes translation doesn't have bookmarks, so I took the liberty of adding them myself. You can either download my version with the bookmarks added, or if you're a bit paranoid (can't blame ya) and don't mind some light command line work you can use the same simple script that I did with my formatted plaintext bookmarks to take the PDF from libgen and add the bookmarks yourself.

Resources

(These are not expected reading, these are here to help you if you so choose)

  • Harvey's guide to reading it: https://www.davidharvey.org/media/Intro_A_Companion_to_Marxs_Capital.pdf

  • A University of Warwick guide to reading it: https://warwick.ac.uk/fac/arts/english/currentstudents/postgraduate/masters/modules/worldlitworldsystems/hotr.marxs_capital.untilp72.pdf

  • Engels' Synopsis of Capital or PDF

  • Reading Capital with Comrades: A Liberation School podcast series - https://www.liberationschool.org/reading-capital-with-comrades-podcast/

  • Kolibri [she/her]
    ·
    5 months ago

    Chapter 6 was really good. It really made me look at things in a different perspective a bit? As in like for example the labor market, actually being a market of sorts? Like I always heard labor market before, but it didn't have much meeting? Just a platitude, meaningless words. Other than like, it's hard and frustrating to get a job and how silly the entire process behind job hunting is. But like going to this chapter, it being a market since labor power being a commodity explains it more? or feels like so, but also feels grosser in a way. but I think Marx's kind of describes that gross feeling at the end of the chapter with this

    He, who before was the money-owner, now strides in front as capitalist; the possessor of labour-power follows as his labourer. The one with an air of importance, smirking, intent on business; the other, timid and holding back, like one who is bringing his own hide to market and has nothing to expect but — a hiding.

    I also found these interesting, just gonna spoiler tag it as to not take up too much space.

    spoiler

    the value of labour-power is the value of the means of subsistence necessary for the maintenance of the labourer.

    His means of subsistence must therefore be sufficient to maintain him in his normal state as a labouring individual. His natural wants, such as food, clothing, fuel, and housing, vary according to the climatic and other physical conditions of his country. On the other hand, the number and extent of his so-called necessary wants, as also the modes of satisfying them, are themselves the product of historical development, and depend therefore to a great extent on the degree of civilisation of a country, more particularly on the conditions under which, and consequently on the habits and degree of comfort in which, the class of free labourers has been formed.

    In all cases, therefore, the use-value of the labour-power is advanced to the capitalist: the labourer allows the buyer to consume it before he receives payment of the price; he everywhere gives credit to the capitalist. That this credit is no mere fiction, is shown not only by the occasional loss of wages on the bankruptcy of the capitalist, [13] but also by a series of more enduring consequences.

    but like the later part of this chapter just reminded me of like, my mom living paycheck to paycheck. enough to maybe make food and ends, but never enough to like fully live life? also the idea of like working kind of being a form of credit is something I never thought of. especially with this footnote.

    spoiler

    “All labour is paid after it has ceased.” (“An Inquiry into those Principles Respecting the Nature of Demand,” &c., p. 104.) Le crédit commercial a dû commencer au moment où l’ouvrier, premier artisan de la production, a pu, au moyen de ses économies, attendre le salaire de son travail jusqu’à la fin de la semaine, de la quinzaine, du mois, du trimestre, &c.” [“The system of commercial credit had to start at the moment when the labourer, the prime creator of products, could, thanks to his savings, wait for his wages until the end of the week.”] (Ch. Ganilh: “Des Systèmes d’Econ. Polit.” 2éme édit. Paris, 1821, t. II, p. 150.)

    • ComradeRat [he/him, they/them]
      ·
      5 months ago

      Regarding the grossness and Marx describing it, yeah as we get further into Capital Marx will get more and more explicit about how much stuff sucks (particularly as Marx kicks down the door to the realm of production)

      • Kolibri [she/her]
        ·
        5 months ago

        I can't wait to comprehend more, the man made horrors of capitalism screm3 but like hopefully it's not like too gross or bleak. but its good to really know about everything that really goes on and like yea.

    • Vampire [any]M
      ·
      5 months ago

      Chapter 6 was really good. It really made me look at things in a different perspective a bit?

      We're starting to get into more 'Scary Red' territory rather than academic theories of economics.

      As in like for example the labor market, actually being a market of sorts? Like I always heard labor market before, but it didn't have much meeting? Just a platitude, meaningless words. Other than like, it's hard and frustrating to get a job and how silly the entire process behind job hunting is.

      Yes I was thinking the same. The image you get when you hear "he brings his commodity tot he market" is different from the image you get of "job hunting"

      • Kolibri [she/her]
        ·
        5 months ago

        yea! and like I can't wait to venture more into that 'scary red' territory because Marx is really insightful and smart.

    • Red Wizard 🪄@lemmygrad.ml
      ·
      4 months ago

      I just finished chapter 6 as well and had the same takeaway.

      The points he makes about the only difference between a free worker and a slave is the free worker only exchanges a portion of their labor-power is I think very important.

      It exposes the goal and endgame of the buyer of labor-power. To own a persons labor-power in its totality is to own them, and by extension own the process of producing labor-power. This includes all the commodities involved in housing, subsistence, education, and medical care.

      The value of labor-power is dictated currently by the collective actions of the proletariat in the commody market. However it you had full control over a persons labor-power, you can control what kind of housing, food, medical care, and education they get.

      In the absence of totally owning their labor-power, capitalists attempted to instead attack this problem externally by owning the towns the workers lived in. This is WHY company towns existed, becuase slavery was generally outlawed.

      Its why we have for profit prison systems. They are effectively the peak of capitalist external intervention in the process of owning labor-power in its totality.

      At its core the struggle has always been pure freedom against pure slavery.

      • Kolibri [she/her]
        ·
        4 months ago

        yea! and I feel like this is very relevant from Marx to what you said, from chapter 9.

        The essential difference between the various economic forms of society, between, for instance, a society based on slave-labour, and one based on wage-labour, lies only in the mode in which this surplus-labour is in each case extracted from the actual producer, the labourer

        • Red Wizard 🪄@lemmygrad.ml
          ·
          4 months ago

          Ha! Naturally, if anyone is to extract the surplus, it should be the worker, so that they can decide how best to apply this surplus. You can see how this analysis leads us to collectivism.