Value criticism

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As a critique of value is called a theory of building certain post-Marxist critical approaches to the bourgeois capitalist society.

Positions

Value critics take over from Karl Marx his criticism of the commodity fetishism of goods , value and money . Like him, you oppose social mediation through (abstract) work , but criticize Marx's class theory and the philosophy of history of Marxism . The working class is therefore not of value critical view themselves part of the capitalist system and capable of a role as a revolutionary subject to take over.

Work is not viewed as a supra-historical form of activity, as is the case in “traditional Marxism”, but it is criticized as capitalism- specific gainful employment , as is capital , since both are based on the same system of valorization. The systemic occurrence of the incessantly self-evaluating value is fetishistically objectified in capitalist society as an ensemble of practical constraints and, according to a Marxian formulation, “ automatic subject ” ( Das Kapital vol. 1, MEW 23: p. 169). People mainly serve these practical constraints , which people actually created themselves, as objects and material within the recycling process, which is determined by goods , value , money and (abstract) work. Everything sensual , people and their needs as well as the ecological system of the earth and nature remain external to the system of value utilization and are in principle indifferent to it.

The capitalism is criticized by critics value because it for them, the indirect rule represents an abstract relationship about the people nevertheless actively reproduce people this ratio every single day itself. Many value critics consider the theorem of value splitting developed by Roswitha Scholz to be an essential determinant of bourgeois-capitalist society. “Value” and “separation” are understood as a dialectically mediated and broken structural relationship that pervades and essentially shapes this social order or the “commodity-producing patriarchy ” and the individuals living in it like a weave.

The bourgeois Enlightenment and the "bourgeois subject" (as a capitalist form of preparation of the human individual) are vehemently criticized by value critics. Above all, they tie in with the findings of the critical theory of Adorno and Horkheimer and the psychoanalysis of Sigmund Freud - but they push their approaches beyond themselves, expand and change them. Often they lose the dialectic of liberation and coercion, which Horkheimer and Adorno in particular emphasize.

To overcome the commodity-patriarchal relationships and formations / arrangements and to strive for a new society, an " association of free people " (Marx), is the declared aim of value criticism. It represents the perspective of a transformation of the existing conditions towards a liberated society in which the satisfaction of human needs is not mediated through work, value and money, but takes place directly through the consultation of the members of society ( e.g. organized by councils ). For the most part, however, it focuses on the theoretical critique of contemporary society. The other, desired one is mostly only negatively determined by the criticism of existing constraints and unreasonable demands and it is seldom explained in more concrete terms how an emancipatory transformation could be possible.

The best-known representatives of value criticism in Germany are the groups Krisis and EXIT! , the Value-Critical Communists Leipzig , which existed from 1999 to 2006, and the SINet group in Austria .

In a Tele-Akademie contribution from 2015, Norbert Trenkle argues that the former economic compensation mechanism of capital - which functioned reasonably well into the 1970s - no longer works. Through the continuous growth of the real economy, this mechanism ensured that the main increase in capital was fed from it and at the same time employed enough people to finance their lives in this economy. In the meantime, rationalization in the real economy - more and more products are being made by fewer and fewer people - has undermined this mechanism. The number of employees in car production decreased from 9.5 million to 8.5 million between 1980 and 2007, while the number of units increased from 39.4 million to 70.5 million, although today's cars are much more complex as previously. Therefore, capital is increasingly turning to the financial markets, because these promise better returns and potential for sale. Because the (fictitious) capital of the financial economy now accounts for a multiple of the capital of the real economy, there are also more and more frequent financial crises, which become “systemically relevant” and at the same time - because of their impact on the banking system - also threaten the real economy. The lack of "systemic relevance" of the real economy means that the central banks increasingly have to deal with the crises in the financial markets and the banking system and that there is a risk of hyperinflation due to the increasing purchase of government bonds . This creates a system in which national debt increases and some countries have to save on infrastructure and social security in order to be able to borrow new money (for debt). Trenkel's conclusion: The current economic potential could, under different social conditions and circumstances, serve to allow all people a good life and to produce in an environmentally friendly way. This can only be achieved “when the production of economic wealth is no longer dependent on the accumulation of capital” and if, moreover, “society is organized in such a way that people freely decide what, how, where and in which Form they make things ”.

Criticism of value criticism

The criticism of value is often accused of sticking to a "critical criticism", which also leaves little room for options for action. While in other parts of the left attempts are being made to implement an idea of ​​a different, non-capitalist world in concrete terms, the critique of values ​​does not provide any impulses in this regard.

Numerous representatives of postoperaist currents such as Gerhard Hanloser and Karl Reitter accuse value criticism of shortened reading of Marx. The critique of value consider all phenomena of capital from the standpoint of the sphere of circulation . However, this is not to be understood in terms of itself, but can only arise through the opposition of labor and capital. Against this background, the value-critical farewell to the proletariat is too premature:

“Criticism of value is simply based on the process of leveling the opposition between exchange value and use value, between concrete and abstract work, between work and valorisation processes in a monistic manner. The social horizon remains that of the simple owner of goods, with all related contrafactual insinuations (equals and free exchange equivalents). Since the whole process is subject to the movement M - W - G ', the whole of society and all classes are equally subject to the fetish and alienation, the dictates of the automatic subject. "

- Karl Reitter : Read capital again. An alternative to the critical interpretation.

A similar criticism was also expressed from the environment of the Marx Society: Nadja Rakowitz and Jürgen Behre criticize the value-critical conception of capital as an automatic subject . Here some of the terms used by Marx with critical intent would be considered for adequate descriptions of economic reality. Ingo Elbe therefore assumes that value criticism is criticizing capitalism with the help of religious categories.

However, this criticism is rejected by the value-critical side, which in turn accuses its critics of having a criticism of capitalism that is limited to the sphere of circulation through the use of an ontological concept of work. Robert Kurz undertook a detailed examination of the way in which the critique of value dealt with the relationship between theory and practice in a lengthy essay in 2007.

See also

literature

criticism

Web links

Individual evidence

  1. ^ Marx: Das Kapital I, MEW 23, 92
  2. ^ Norbert Trenkle: The great devaluation. About the fundamental causes of the financial and economic crisis. In: SWR Fernsehen Tele-Akademie. October 18, 2015, accessed November 16, 2019 .
  3. ↑ Karl Reitter: Read the capital again. An alternative to the critical interpretation
  4. ↑ Jürgen Behre, Nadja Rakowitz: Automatic Subject? On the meaning of the concept of capital in Marx
  5. ↑ Christian Höner: The reality of the automatic subject
  6. ↑ Robert Kurz: Gray is the golden tree of life and green is the theory . in: EXIT! 4 (2007), pp. 15-106, ISBN 978-3-89502-230-2