Capital is a central concept in
Marx
Karl Marx (; 5 May 1818 – 14 March 1883) was a German philosopher, political theorist, economist, journalist, and revolutionary socialist. He is best-known for the 1848 pamphlet '' The Communist Manifesto'' (written with Friedrich Engels) ...
ian
critique of political economy
Critique of political economy or simply the first critique of economy is a form of social critique that rejects the conventional ways of distributing resources. The critique also rejects what its advocates believe are unrealistic axioms, flawe ...
, and in Marxian thought more generally.
Marxists view capital as a
social relation
A social relation is the fundamental unit of analysis within the social sciences, and describes any voluntary or involuntary interpersonal relationship between two or more conspecifics within and/or between groups. The group can be a language or ...
reproduced by the continuous expenditure of
wage labour
Wage labour (also wage labor in American English), usually referred to as paid work, paid employment, or paid labour, refers to the socioeconomic relationship between a worker and an employer in which the worker sells their labour power under ...
. Labour and capital are viewed as historically specific forms of social relations.
Marx stated that "''Capital is dead labour, that, vampire-like, only lives by sucking living labour, and lives the more, the more labour it sucks.''"
See also
* ''
Property is theft!
Property is a system of rights that gives people legal control of valuable things, and also refers to the valuable things themselves. Depending on the nature of the property, an owner of property may have the right to consume, alter, share, r ...
''
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Private property#Criticism
*
*Forms of capital in Marxism:
**
Constant capital — Capital invested in the
means of production
In political philosophy, the means of production refers to the generally necessary assets and resources that enable a society to engage in production. While the exact resources encompassed in the term may vary, it is widely agreed to include the ...
.
**
Variable capital
Constant capital (c; ), is a concept created by Karl Marx and used in Marxian political economy. It refers to one of the forms of capital invested in production, which contrasts with variable capital (v; ). The distinction between constant an ...
— Capital invested in
labour power.
**
**''
Monopoly Capital''
Key figures:
*
Robert Kurz
*
Moishe Postone
*
Roman Rosdolsky
Roman Osipovich Rosdolsky (, ''Roman Osypovyč Rozdol's'kyj''; July 19, 1898 – October 20, 1967) was a prominent Ukrainian Marxian scholar, historian and political theorist. Rodolsky's book of 1968 entitled ''Zur Entstehungsgeschichte des Mar ...
References
Bibliography
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Further reading
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{{Economy-stub
Marxian critique of political economy
Marxism
Capital (economics)