Capital, Chapter 7:
The Labor Process
&
the Valorization Process
Structure of Chapter
Section 1: The Labor Process (in general)
 Section 2: Valorization (in capitalism)

The Labor Process in General
Generic discussion (a-historical)
 Labor Process = three elements

 a)
workers using
 b) tools to transfrom
 c) non-human nature

Humans transforming nature
 humans
active, have will
 nature passive, no will
Questionable Assumptions

assumption that generic discussion is
possible
 concept

of “labor” itself historically determined
assumption that only humans have will
 plenty
of evidence that much of rest of nature
also has “will” in some sense, to some degree

Hegelian, Enlightenment tradition
 anthropocentric
perspective, destructive
Objectification

In the labor process workers, as active
subjects, exercise their will in order to:
 appropriate
nature
 transform
it
 embue products with aspect of themselves
Product is objectification of workers’
subjectivity, individually & collectively
 Humanity makes nature part of itself

Living & the Dead
As active subject, Marx treats workers as
“living”
 As passive objects, Marx treats tools & raw
materials as “dead”
 Labor process = necromancy, raising the
dead
 Labor = life giving, creative process

Labor as self-realization

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Worker acts according to own will
So, worker realizes individual self as subject in
world
Worker objectifies self in product, concreteness
Labor is social, collective
So, worker realizes self as member of a
community in the world
Self vis à vis Collectivity

Marx: “In your enjoyment or use of my
product I would have the direct enjoyment both
of being conscious of having satisfied a human
need by my work, that is, of having objectified
man’s essential nature, and of having thus
created an object corresponding to the need of
another man’s essential nature. I would have
been for you the mediator between you and the
species . . .
in the individual expression of my life I would
have directly created your expression of your
life, and therefore in my individual activity I
would have directly confirmed and realized my
true nature, my humanm nature, my communal
nature. Our products would be so many
mirrors in which we saw reflected our essential
nature.”
Other forms of self-realization
Some have seen Marx’s analysis of work as
specificity of what it is to be human
 But, we can also read it as an analysis of
ONE way to be human
 His concern with reduction of work shows
his awareness of other forms of selfrealization: replacement of labor value by
disposable time as measure of wealth

Sec 2: The Valorization Process
“Valorization” = labor process within
capitalism, ...P... within entire circuit
 Hired labor, working under capitalist
control, producing products which are sold
and on which a profit is realized, so that the
whole process can be carried out again on a
larger scale.
 i.e, M - C(LP,MP) ...P... C’ - M’.M - etc.

Valorization

“Quantitative” aspect
 focus
in this chapter
 turns out to be major “qualitative” aspect

Other Qualitative aspects
 focus
in 1844 Manuscripts
 we’ll return to this afterwords
Quantitative Aspect: Surplus Value

In general terms: investment = M - C(LP, MP)

In value terms:
 Investment:
M=C+V
 C = constant capital = value that buys C
 V = variable capital = value that buys LP

Criterion of success:
 Total
value must = C + V + S = M’
 S = surplus value = M’ - M
Surplus Value = Greed
Usual critical reading: S = profits
 Profits desired for personal enrichment
 S = motive of capitalist activity =
investment to make money to get rich
 Evidence:

 top
CEOs make millions
 socially irresponsible speculation
 USSteel takeover of Marathon Oil
Surplus Value = Social Service
Usual apology: profits create jobs
 Capitalism as “gift-giving” (G.Guilder)


S = M’ - M = profits ()
  is reinvested as new M

which creates more jobs, output
Surplus Value = Surplus Labor
Political reading of surpus value?
 Substance of value = abstract labor
 Abstract labor = labor as K’s social control
 Surplus value = surplus abstract labor =
surplus social control


S =  = more jobs, but more jobs means
more social control
Gothic Metaphors - 1


Marx:“Capital is dead
labor, which, vampire
like, lives only by
sucking living labor,
and lives the more, the
more it sucks.”
Sucking living labor =
imposing work
Gothic Metaphors - 2


Marx: “Were-wolf
hunger for surplus
value”
Shelly: Frankenstein
 Dr.
Frankenstein = life
giving worker (Sec. 1)
 Monster = product
turned against creator
(Sec. 2)
Qualitative Aspects: Alienation

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Valorization = ever more labor
Ques: what kind of labor?
Ans: Alienated Labor
Valorization involves transformation in the
meaning of work for those engaged in it
Instead of self activity, it becomes an activity
imposed from the outside
This imposition has negative consequences
Kinds of alienation:
1. Labor itself is alienated
2. Product is alienated
3. Workers are alienated from each other
4. Workers are alienated from species being
1. Alienated labor
Capitalist control means lack of control for
workers
 Instead of executing their own wills, they
execute those of the capitalists
 They do not choose, but are told what to do,
how to do it, at what rythmn, etc.
 From using tools, they find themselves
increasingly subordinated to machines

Alienated Labor in Factory




Early on: capitalists annex workers who still
control, manage their work
Later: they take control of work by gathering
workers in factories
Capitalists reorganize work to improve their
control, extract more labor, more surplus labor
E.g., Taylorism: separation of manual & mental
labor
Alienated Labor in School
Schools = “sites of learning”??
 Learning ≠ following your curiosity &
intellectual nose, ≠ self realization of desires
 Schools = activity organized from outside
 Students told what to do and how to do it
 Learning = schoolWORK, homeWORK
 Schools = disciplining of labor power

2. Alienated product
Before product was objectification of
workers’ wills
 In capitalism product is K’s design
 Moreover, capitalists OWN the product
 Capitalist control over product gives them
control over workers, e.g., both C’ as MP
and C’ as MS, machines, arcade games

3. Alienated relationships
Co-operation can be collaboration toward
collectively defined ends
 But, capitalist control organizes division of
labor for exterior goals in ways designed to
divide and conquer
 Workers are pitted against workers
 Competition among individuals

4. Alienation from Species-being
For Marx “species-being” is what makes
humans unique: exercize of will,
individually and collectively
 But by imposing work capitalists usurp will
and deny it to workers
 K tries to reduce workers to drones, taking
orders, doing what they are told
 Even with respect to “creative” work

Alienation & Attitude

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NB: all of above ignores workers’ feelings and
attitudes
BUT, alienation often does imply estrangement in
attitude as well as activity
Workers resent imposition of work
Workers resent competition, etc
Workers estranged, lonely, or angry
Frequently expressed in popular culture
Sounds of Silence
Hello darkness my old friend
I've come to talk with you again
Because the vision is softly creeping
Left its seeds while I was sleeping
And the vision that was planted in my brain
Still remains within the Sounds of Silence
In restless dreams I walked alone
Down the streets of cobblestone
Beneath the halo of the 8th Street lamp
I turned my collar to the cold and damp
When my eyes were stabbed by the flash of a
neon light
that split the night and touched the Sounds of
Silence
And in the naked light I saw:
10,000 people, maybe more
People talking without speaking
People hearing without listening
People writing songs that voices never share
No one dares
Disturb the Sounds of Silence
Fools said oh you do not know
Silence like a cancer grows
Hear my words that I might teach you
Take my arms that I might reach you
But my words like silent raindrops fell
Echo the wells of silence
And the people bowed and prayed
To the neon god they made
And the sign flashed out its warning
In the words that it was forming
And the sign said the words of the prophets
Are written on the subway walls,
tenement halls
Disperse the Sounds of Silence.
“Sounds of Silence”
Simon & Garfunkel,
Sounds of Silence, 1965 in Collected Works
Columbia, 1990,
CD 45322
Revolt Against Alienation




Workers subvert labor process, introduce their
own modifications, reappropriate it
Workers directly appropriate output, on the
job and off
Workers elaborate networks of collaboration
outside and against K div of L
Workers assert their own species-being either
constructively or destructively, on job or off
Alienation of Capitalists?
Capitalists get to command
 Capitalists get to exercise THEIR wills
 Products belong to them
 No alienation among capitalists?
 Capitalists only free humans?
 Capitalists as happy heros?

Alienation of Capitalists

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

Capitalists impose work on themselves --prototypical
“workaholics”, accept/impose endless stress
Capitalist “will” not free, but circumscribed by rules of
game
Capitalists alienated from workers due to antagonistic
relationships, not heros but villains
Capitalists alienated from other capitalists, must
compete to survive
Workaholism = alienation from friendships, family
Expressed in high & popular culture
Alienation of Capitalists in High Culture

Shakespeare
 Shylock
in Merchant of Venice
 Alienated from daughter

Richard Wagner
 Das
Rheinegeld
 Reine maidens warn against gaining gold and
losing love
Alienation of Capitalists in Popular
Culture

In literature
 J. Austin’s
Mansfield Park
 C. Dickens’ Dombey And Son
 H. Melville’s Moby Dick

In song
 60s:
Simon & Garfunkel’s Richard Cory
 80s: Explosives, Come Clean
Richard Cory
They say that Richard Cory
owns one half of this whole town
with elliptical connections
to spread his wealth around
born into society
a banker's only child
he had everything a man could want
power, grace and style
(chorus)
But I work in his factory
and I curse the life I'm livin
and I curse my poverty
and I wish that I could be
oh I wish that I could be
oh I wish that I could be
Richard Cory
The papers print his picture
almost everywhere I go
Richard Cory at the opera
Richard Cory at the show
and the rumours of his parties
and the orgies on his yacht
Oh he surely must be happy
With everything he's got
(repeat chorus)
But I work in his factory
and I curse the life I'm livin
and I curse my poverty
and I wish that I could be
oh I wish that I could be
oh I wish that I could be
Richard Cory
He freely gave to charity
he had the common touch
and they were grateful for his patronage
and they thanked him very much
so my mind was filled with wonder
when the evening headlines read
Richard Cory went home last night
and put a bullet through his head
(repeat chorus)
But I work in his factory
and I curse the life I'm livin
and I curse my poverty
and I wish that I could be
oh I wish that I could be
oh I wish that I could be
Richard Cory
Paul Simon & Art Garfunkel,
Sounds of Silence, 1965
Collected Works, 1990
CD 45322
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