*Ed Writes:"On my understanding Marx argues (in vol. I ch. 25) that, with mature capitalist production, there exists a permanent “surplus” population. This is unique to this social configuration; it doesn’t happen in pre-capitalist societies nor in capitalist social forms in their infancy. The size of this population is not fixed: it varies (Marx suggests) with the business cycle. The construction of this surplus population (the “immiseration”, so to speak, of a part of the proletariat) is, in this sense, a one-off event . "*
Population is a large abstraction. Where exactly does this "permanent surplus population" that doesn't exist in pre-capitalist society nor capitalist social forms in their infancy arise? It's my understanding that "surplus" value or population arises from economic laws that extract a surplus in one of two ways. There is absolute and relative extraction of surplus value, absolute extraction pertains to the increasing of the duration of working time, relative surplus value pertains to the technological efficiency that allows more value to be created in less time. When Marx speaks of the expansion and contraction of the industrial reserve army from the standpoint of wages he is speaking to fluctuations in the employment of socially necessary labor within and across sectors of the economy. The relativity between workers and non-workers creates the possibility of abstracting relative surplus value because the wage can be lowered in proportion to the supply of labor employed by a greater or lesser demand for socially necessary labor. The population that is considered a surplus is not a fixed class composition like feudal serfs but a continual recalculation of the organic composition of capital itself. Not sure how this can be a "one off event" "Taking them as a whole, the general movements of wages are exclusively regulated by the expansion and contraction of the industrial reserve army, and these again correspond to the periodic changes of the industrial cycle. They are, therefore, not determined by the variations of the absolute number of the working population, but by the varying proportions in which the working class is divided into active and reserve army, by the increase or diminution in the relative amount of the surplus population, by the extent to which it is now absorbed, now set free." (Marx vol. I ch. 25 section 3) In terms of pre-capitalist society surplus population can be seen in serfdom and slavery versus the development of productive labor. Here both the employment of labor and the activity objectified from the usage of labor power form an "alien will," e.g. a master-servant relationship. The development of surplus population is the mediation of this original relation of production because the modern unemployed population is alienated by the diminishing return of remuneration in the form of wages. Alienated from both their capacity to directly exchange their labor power for socially necessary work, and the laboring activity of their comrades whose employment is also alienated, the surplus population is a necessary regulation of disposable time that is either absorbed or set free in the process of competition for employment between the various branches of industry. "The presupposition of the master–servant relation is the appropriation of an alien *will. *Whatever has no will, e.g. the animal, may well provide a service, but does not thereby make its owner into a *master. *This much can be seen here, however, that the *master–servant relation *likewise belongs in this formula of the appropriation of the instruments of production; and it forms a necessary ferment for the development and the decline and fall of all original relations of property and of production, just as it also expresses their limited nature. Still, it is reproduced – in mediated form – in capital, and thus likewise forms a ferment of its dissolution and is an emblem of its limitation." ( Marx Grundrisse Notebook V ) *"Nevertheless, it is also true that there is nothing in the mature Marx (post-48) that supports the view that he held to an immiseration thesis."* Finally, in terms of the immiseration thesis. I do think that the concept of mediation and displacement outlined in Notebook V point to the successive displacement of the original law of value which continues to replicate the master-servant relationship that leads labor to a point where it loses the capacity to accumulate property and even the capacity to work in some instances. Whether this rises to the level of an immiseration thesis is questionable. I consider it more so the consequence of the contradiction in the capitalist mode of production itself. Those bourgeois apologists that argue for the gradual improvement or socialization of the labor process miss the mark economically. Even Adam Smith was attuned to the depreciation of the prices stating its more accurate to measure the historical changes in the price of corn then it is to measure the change of the price of goods in gold or silver. For Smith corn was a necessary expense that was tied to the valorization of labor itself, a necessity that could be traced to the needs of the working class in ways in which nominal money cannot. However if we consider nominal money relations such as the rising cost of living are never outstripped by the rising minimum wage. As wages increase so does the proportion of the wage that must be used to acquire corn. The continued replication of this master servant relation could be related to immiseration but if one follows late Marx in the footnotes of the critique of Gotha Program he seems to attribute the advances of working conditions to the development of both the state form and the advancement of the capitalist mode of production. Cheers, Ben On Sat, Nov 15, 2025 at 11:55 AM Ed George via groups.io <edgeorge1963= [email protected]> wrote: > On Sat, Nov 15, 2025 at 07:10 PM, Tom Walker wrote: > > On Sat, Nov 15, 2025 at 09:53 AM, Ed George wrote: > > That is not an "immiseration thesis". > > Not in the sense that it posits the immiseration of an entire class, no. > It is, however, something that people can understandably project and > magnify into such. It does talk about the misery of a consolidated mass of > surplus population and contrasts their *misery* to the *torture* that > they would experience as labourers. The "tortured" are not necessarily > immiserated in the economic sense of not having werewithal for securing the > necessities of life. One might, however, feel that it is miserable in > another sense to undergo "torture in the form of labour." > > > > On my understanding Marx argues (in vol. I ch. 25) that, with mature > capitalist production, there exists a permanent “surplus” population. This > is unique to this social configuration; it doesn’t happen in pre-capitalist > societies nor in capitalist social forms in their infancy. The size of this > population is not fixed: it varies (Marx suggests) with the business cycle. > The construction of this surplus population (the “immiseration”, so to > speak, of a part of the proletariat) is, in this sense, a one-off event . > This is not the sense in which people impute the notion of immiseration to > Marx, in so far as it is argued that Marx held that as capitalist > reproduction proceeds either the whole proletariat or some part of it will > be driven into increasing degrees of misery, to eventually subsist at the > bare minimum of the possibilities of human existence. Marx, post 48/49, > doesn’t give this idea any credence; he explicitly opposes the view, > central in Malthus, and present in (parts of) RIcardo, that the natural > tendency of the accumulation of capital was the progressive deterioration > of the level of material existence of the proletariat to bare subsistence > level. So I don’t think it is helpful to call what the post 48/48 Marx sets > out in *Capital* (and elsewhere) “immiseration” since what he sets out is > different to what the word is commonly used to indicate. > > > > > -=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=- Groups.io Links: You receive all messages sent to this group. View/Reply Online (#39276): https://groups.io/g/marxmail/message/39276 Mute This Topic: https://groups.io/mt/116301050/21656 -=-=- POSTING RULES & NOTES #1 YOU MUST clip all extraneous text when replying to a message. #2 This mail-list, like most, is publicly & permanently archived. #3 Subscribe and post under an alias if #2 is a concern. #4 Do not exceed five posts a day. -=-=- Group Owner: [email protected] Unsubscribe: https://groups.io/g/marxmail/leave/13617172/21656/1316126222/xyzzy [[email protected]] -=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-
