Takahisa Oishi
Professor of Economics
Takushoku University
Tokyo, Japan
An Overview of Marx-Studies in Japan
Many Marxist economists in Japan still believe that
Marx's early writings, i.e. those preceding The German
Ideology (manuscripts of 1845-46), are directed towards
'philosophy' or 'thought', and that this orientation
was superseded through the ''self-clarification' recorded
there. They portray the 'early Marx ' as essentially
a 'philosopher' and the 'late Marx' as an 'economist'.
They take the relationship of The German Ideology
to Capital (first published 1867) to be similar to
the relationship between Adam Smith's The Theory of
Moral Sentiments and his The Wealth of Nations.
Wataru Hiromatsu conceptualised this 'rupture'
between the early and the late Marx as a development
'from the theory of alienation to the theory of reification',
and this view is widely supported in Japan. This 'rupture"
is also conceived by some economists as a development
'from the negation of Ricardo's theory of value to
its acceptance'. For example, Yoshiki Yoshizawa writes
that the early Marx did not understand the terms of
the classical labour theory of value and rejected it
until The Poverty of Philosophy (first published 1847).
Others say that the theory of alienation in the Economic
Philosophical Manuscripts of 1844 (hereafter EPM) required
Marx to reject the classical labour theory of value
(Kiyoshi Matsui & Kyuzo Asobe). But some scholars
within this group do admit a consistency between the
theory of alienation and Marx's theory of value, they
argue that the theory of alienation represents a philosophy
underlying the labour theory of value (Shiro Sugihara
& Yoshihiko Uchida).
Despite the discovery of the Grundrisse (manuscripts
of 1857-8), which represent a link between EPM and
Capital, a few researchers insist that there is a
'rupture' between the Manuscripts of 1861-63 and
Capital, because the term 'alienation' can be found
even as late as the early 1860s (Wataru Hiromatsu,
Keizo Hayasaka). Hiroshi Nakagawa, whose view increased
in popularity after N.I. Lapin's article, denies that
there is a theoretical continuity between the early
and the late Marx by claiming that his early economic
theory exhibits a lack of unity between the following
two analyses: the capital-labour relation and the commodity-money
relation. Nakagawa presumes that Marx wrote EPM in
the following order:
EPM "First Manuscript: Former Part", ->
EPM "First Manuscript:
Latter Part" (analysis of civil society from the
standpoint of the capital-labour relation, without
analysis from the standpoint of the commodity-money
relation: rejection of Ricardo's labour theory of value)
-> "Notes on James Mill" (analysis of
civil society from the standpoint of the commodity-money
relation, without analysis from the standpoint of the
capital-labour relation) -> EPM "Second Manuscript:
Missing Part" -> EPM "Second Manuscript:
Extant Part" -> EPM "Third Manuscript".
Nakagawa asserts that it was in the Grundrisse
that Marx's analysis first encompassed these two
standpoints: the commodity- money relation and the
capital-labour relation. Following the order of composition
as set out by N. I. Lapin, Seiji Mochizuki writes that
Marx gave up the "First Manuscript" of the
EPM at the halfway point because he found a theoretical
contradiction in the theory of alienation. Mochizuki
believes that the theory of alienation is 'idealist'
in a philosophical sense, because it presupposes a
'non-alienated man', so Marx gave up using the term
'alienation' and came to use 'division of labour' instead.
What Mochizuki has overlooked is the theoretical
consistency between the first EPM manuscript "First
Manuscript: Latter Part" and the third EPM manuscript
"Third Manuscript".
He fails to understand the content of the "First
Manuscript:
Latter Part" (comprehension of the laws of economics
on the basis of the concept 'estranged labour' as 'general
essence of private property'): this analysis also figures
in the Grundrisse and the Manuscripts of 1861-63.
Yoshiki Yoshizawa (a specialist on Ricardo) writes
that at first Marx 'rejected' Ricardo's labour theory
of value (as did D.I. Rosenberg), but later 'accepted'
it in The Poverty of Philosophy. Yoshizawa concludes
by saying that the 'critique of Ricardo's value theory
was a matter of the 1850s or after for Marx'. Shigeji
Wada (a specialist on Adam Smith) and I, however,
believe that the critical exposition on Ricardo's
labour theory in the "First Manuscript" of
EPM, even in the "Notes on Ricardo", if
examined carefully, does not negate the theory, but
is rather a critique of it.
In the Manuscripts of 1861-63 Marx writes that
there are two types of value theory in Smith's The
Wealth of Nations : the 'dissolving' type and the
'composing' type. Extracts from The Wealth of Nations
in the "First Manuscript: Former Part" of
EPM are limited to the passages in which Smith expounds
the 'dissolving' type. At the beginning of the "First
Manuscript: Latter Part" of EPM Marx put his position
clearly by saying: 'We have proceeded from the premises
of political economy. We have accepted its language
and its laws'. Those who assert that the 'early Marx'
rejected Smith's (or Ricardo's) labour theory of value
reveal that they are not really sure what Marx's labour
theory of value actually is. They cannot distinguish
between Marx's value theory and Ricardo's because they
do not discern the differentia specifica of Marx's
theory and hence cannot successfully separate it from
the classical view.
The classical labour theory of value led classical
economists to affirm private property. Ricardo, like
Smith, could not distinguish 'value' from 'price' and
had no idea how to develop 'price' from 'value'. They
did not understand that the law of value is only a
specific historical way -- a capitalist way -- of distributing
social labour. That is why they did not find the intrinsic
connection between the categories 'commodity' and 'money',
and hence the origin of surplus value. Marx's theory
of value, however,exposes the historical character
of commodity-production and leads us to question,
rather than affirm, private property.
Continuity in Marx's Theoretical System and Methodology
In recent papers I have attempted to demonstrate a continuity
in Marx's theory and method from EPM to Capital by
detailing the continuity between EPM and The Poverty
of Philosophy. The point is not that the term 'alienation"
can or cannot be found in these texts, but rather the
role that the term plays in Marx's system as it developed.
Hence I emphasise the importance of the following:
1) reading The Poverty of Philosophy as a whole,
rather than reading its two chapters separately;
2) clarifying the deficiencies in Ricardo's theory
of value and his method.
When we read Chapter II of The Poverty of Philosophy
carefully, it is clear that Marx criticises not only
Proudhon's but also Ricardo's method. This suggests
that Marx criticises Ricardo's theory of value in Chapter
I as well. In fact, Marx advances beyond Ricardo's
theory there by grasping money as a relation of production
and by trying to clarify the intrinsic relation between
the categories 'commodity' and 'money'. On this basis
an inadequacy common to both Proudhon and Ricardo emerges:
their inability to comprehend what is historically
specific to capitalist relations of production. Although
Proudhon shares this inadequacy with Ricardo, his
Philosophy of the Poverty was an attempt to criticise
classical political economy, albeit an attempt that
failed. Hence Marx wrote that Proudhon had 'arrived
in this roundabout way at the standpoint of classical
political economy" (letter to J.B. Schweitzer,
24 January 1865).
Through this investigation I demonstrated that
The Poverty of Philosophy is not a text in which Marx
accepted either Ricardo's method or his labour theory
of value. Rather it is a text which shows how to criticise
classical political economy, i.e. Ricardo, and it
thus represents a critique of political economy in
polemical form. Taking a critical approach to Ricardo's
theory and method, Marx shows how Proudhon failed to
advance beyond Ricardo. Marx's own critique of political
economy is described there as a critique of the categories
of classical theory based on an analysis of the historical
conditions of capitalist society and its transitory
relations of production.
In The Poverty of Philosophy the economic categories
are defined as prerequisites for capitalist relations
of production. Marx gives a critical analysis of the
historical conditions of existence for each category
(the circumstances which each category reflects) and
of the other social relations which surrounded them.
The theoretical system and the methodology of Marx's
critique of political economy are clearly revealed
in all these works: EPM, The Poverty of Philosophy,
Grundrisse, Critique of Political Economy (first published
1859) and Capital.
Crucial to an understanding of these works and
to reconstructing Marx's view is an understanding
of EPM as a whole, as it is there that Marx outlines
his method. This is a method of critical conceptual
analysis of economic categories, beginning with 'alienated
labour' understood as the 'general essence of private
property'. [1] This is based on a view of capitalist
production as the zenith of private property.
Until recently philosophers have read the "First
Manuscript: Latter Part" and the "Third Manuscript"
of EPM separately from the rest of the manuscript materials.
On the other hand economists have studied only the
"First Manuscript", separately from the
others. However, EPM is actually the first draft
of Marx's overall theoretical system -- 'A Critique
of Political Economy' and each manuscript of EPM has
an intrinsic logical relation to the others, detailed
as follows 1) to 4):
1) "First Manuscript: First Part";
This develops a concept
(Vorstellung ) of bourgeois society; laws of private
property; development of private property (landed property
-- capital -- association); these laws are summarised
at the beginning of the "First Manuscript: Latter
Part". Here capital is determined as the governing
power over the worker's labour and products. Thus we
are witness to the way that Marx reads or interprets
Smith's phrase 'wealth is power'. Considering political
power, Thomas Hobbes wrote 'wealth is power' in Leviathan.
Adam Smith added a paragraph to the third edition
of The Wealth of Nations (Book I, Chapter V), interpreting
this phrase as economic power or 'purchasing power'
in the process of circulation. In EPM Marx redefines
it as 'capital' or the 'commanding power' in the process
of production.
2) "First Manuscript: Latter Part";
This is the first attempt at a comprehension (Begreifung
) of the 'necessary laws of private property' (Marx-Engels
Collected Works, vol. 3, pp.270-1. Hereafter cited
as 3 MEC 270-1); it is the first part of Marx's demonstration
of how they arise from 'the very essence of private
property' (3 MEC 271).
Judging from descriptions here and in the "Second
Manuscript" we can say that the immediate production
process of capital is divided into two component parts,
each of which is analysed separately. These two component
parts can be summarised as follows:
(a) 'the relation of private property as labour'
(3 MEC 285) = 'this realisation of labour appears
as loss of realisation for the workers' (3 MEC 272)
= 'appropriation [of the worker] appears as estrangement,
as alienation' (3 MEC 281) = 'the essence of private
property' (3 MEC 296);
(b) 'the relation of private property as apital'
(3 MEC 285) or 'the property relation of the non-worker
to the worker and to labour' (3 MEC 281) = 'alienation
[of the worker] appears as appropriation [of the non-worker],
estrangement [of the worker] appears as truly becoming
a citizen [Einbürgerung]' (3 MEC 281)[2] =
the concept of private property' (3 MEC 296).
The "First Manuscript: Latter Part"
is the analysis of (a) above, which is logically basis.
Paragraph (b) above is logically deduced from (a) as
'the product, the result, the necessary consequence,
of alienated labour' via the four definitions of 'alienated
labour' that Marx offers.
3) "Second Manuscript"; This is the
second part of Marx's attempt to comprehend the laws
of economics. Here he analyses the other component
of 'alienated labour'. In other words, the immediate
production process of capital is analysed from the
standpoint of capital. The following paragraph, a note
to a missing page of the "Second Manuscript",
shows clearly what Marx did, or at least planned to
do:
We have already seen how the political economist establishes the unity of labour and capital in a variety of ways: (1) Capital is accumulated labour. (2) The purpose of capital within production -- in part, reproduction of capital with profit, in part, capital as raw material (material of labour), and in part, as an automatically working instrument (the machine is capital directly equated with labour) -- is productive labour. (3) The worker is a capital. (4) Wages belong to costs of capital. (5) In relation to the worker, labour is the reproduction of his life-capital. (6) In relation to the capitalist, labour is an aspect of his capital's activity. Finally, (7) The political economist postulates the original unity of capital and labour as the unity of the capitalist and the worker; this is the original state of paradise. The way in which these two aspects, as two persons, confront each other is for the political economist an accidental event and hence only to be explained by reference to external factors ( 3 MEC 312; emphasis added).
This paragraph above shows that Marx analysed the process
of
production in the "Second Manuscript", defining
the roles of the following three elements in the process
of production: labour, materials and machine. The emphasised
sentence indicates that Marx had already grasped that
labour reproduces capital with profit in the process
of production.
At this stage of the analysis the term 'capital'
is used for the first time, so we can observe a genetic
description. Marx proceeded from 'an actual economic
fact' that 'labour produces not only commodities :
it produces itself and the worker as a commodity'
(3 MEC 272). Through the analysis of the 'fact', Marx
derived 'the essence of private property' and 'the
concept of private property' in the "First Manuscript:
Latter Part". Here, after a twofold analysis
of the immediate process of production of capital,
'commodity' and 'private property' are defined further
as 'capital', 'accumulated labour' reproduced with
profit , which has reached the stage of 'indifference
to its content'.
A supposition concerning the contents of the missing
pages of the "Second Manuscript" is that
they would have covered the 'three stages of exchange'
in the Notes on James Mill. This seems nonsense to
me. History, qua history, is no longer Marx's concern
from the "First Manuscript: Latter Part"
onwards. Even in the "Notes on James Mill",
Marx's concern is with the development of the economic
categories, e.g. 'exchange' from 'private property'.
The contents of these missing pages can be inferred
from the descriptions in the extant pages of EPM.[3]
Moreover I would point out that the last paragraph
of the "Second Manuscript" is a sketch of
the development of the economic categories. The last
paragraph of the Notes on James Mill ("First
Note") is also the same kind of sketch. They
are not descriptive history at all.
Some commentators say that Marx confused 'capital'
with 'private property in general', but such comments
display ignorance of his analysis. Capital should and
must be developed or explained from simpler and more
abstract categories within Marx's system. Crucial to
comprehending 'capital' as 'self-realising value' is
a grasp of capital as a social relation containing
'alienated labour' as a necessary element. 'Capital'
becomes fully comprehensible through 'alienated labour',
i.e. the 'essence of private property' which produces
the 'property relationship of the non-worker to the
worker and his products', i.e. 'the concept of private
property'.
4) "ThirdÅ@Manuscript" (References
to the "Second
Manuscript"): This demonstrates how 'alienated
or estranged abour' is the logical basis of the following:
(a) the necessary development in economic theories:
'F. Quesnay as the transition from the mercantile system
to
Adam Smith' (3 MEC 292);
(b) the real movement of private property: capital
as a world-historical power' (3 MEC 293) and as a contradiction
driving towards resolution;
(c) the development of economic categories: the
overwhelming power that profit and rent have over labour
is rooted in the immediate process of production, the
misery of workers in capitalist society is the logical
result of the alienation of creative abilities [Arbeitsvermögen]
capitalists (see the critique of "The Trinity
Formula" in the Manuscripts of 1861-63 ).
Commentators who have conceptualised Marx's theoretical
development as culminating in the 'old Marx' have told
us nothing new. What is crucial for those who want
to learn from Marx's method is to absorb his intellectual
development, to follow how he comes to define his terms.
From this viewpoint I would like to remind readers
of a paragraph in the Grundrisse, in which Marx analyses
the failure of Smith and Ricardo to comprehend the
origin of surplus value:
Thus capital does not originally realise itself -- precisely because the appropriation of alien labour [fremde Arbeit] is not itself included in its concept. Capital appears only afterwards, after already having been presupposed as capital -- a vicious circle -- as command over alien labour (Pelican ed., p. 330).
As I have already shown above, Smith interprets Hobbes's
'wealth is power' as economic power, i.e. 'purchasing
power', but meant the purchasing power of commodities
in circulation only. Marx interpreted this once again
and gave it another sense, i.e. capital is 'commanding
power' over the worker and his products in the process
of production. Marx criticised Smith because he grasped
capital only as command in circulation but not as the
power in production process. If Smith had seen power
in the process of production, he could easily have
understood the origin of surplus value.
By 'command' Marx understands 'capital' as a 'production
relation of which alienated labour is one essential
element", and thus he comes to define capital
as 'self-realising value': value which increases itself
through the labour of others. It is this understanding
which leads him to explain the origin of surplus value
and to define capital as a social relation of production,
as a process and as a 'self-realising value'. It is
with this idea that EPM begins:
What is the basis of capital, that is, of private property in the products of other men's labour? . . .Capital is thus the governing power over labour and its products. . . . Later we shall see first how the capitalist, by means of capital, exercises his governing power over labour,[4] then, however we shall see the governing power of capital over the capitalist himself (3 MEC 246-7).
Notes
ä(TM)ññíç********************************
[1]. Crucial to a full understanding of Marx's communism is distinguishing the two terms: 'concept of private property' (der Begriff des Privateigentums ) and 'essence of private property' (das Wesen des Privateigentums ). See Marx's critique of 'crude communism'.
It has, indeed, grasped its [private property's] concept,
but not its [private property's] essence (3 MEC 296).
The English version of EPM, however, prevents readers
from understanding this fully by translating das Wesen
into either 'essence' or 'nature' (see 3 MEC 271,
281, 290, 294 and 296).
[2]. Even in MEGA2, IV-2, the text is read as 'truly
becoming a
citizen (Einbürgerung ). In my opinion, however,
the term should be read as 'absorption (Einverleibung
) or, at least, the two should be taken to be similar.
See the following passage in the Grundrisse :
Firstly: The appropriation [Aneignung ], absorption [Einverleibung] of labour by capital -- money, i.e. the act of buying the capacity of disposing over the worker . . .brings capital into ferment, and makes it into a process, process of production, . . . (Pelican ed., p.301).
In this connection, I would like to point out that the 'devaluation of men' (3 MEC 271) means 'wage labour':
His [The worker's] valuelessness and devaluation is
the presupposition of capital and the precondition
of free labour in general (Grundrisse, Pelican ed.,
p.289).
[3]. See "First Manuscript: Latter Part", 3 MEC 274, 279, 281; "Second Manuscript", 3 MEC 285, 289; "Third Manuscript", 3 MEC 312.
[4]. See "3. THE RULE OF CAPITAL OVER LABOUR AND THE MOTIVES OF THE CAPITALIST" (3 MEC 250).