Tom Kruse writes: >>> I've just reviewed Marx on "formal" vs. "real" subsumption of labor to capital, the former understood as "...capital [making] use of noncapitalist modes of production while leaving the means of production in the hands of the producers and leaving internal processes such as self-explotation and exploitation of unremunerated family labor in place." (Wilson 1998:7) <<< I replied: >>I don't think that's it. I would call that semi-proletarianization, a partial insertion of capitalism into other modes of exploitation.<< Angela writes: >this may well explain certain instances in terms of uneven development, the incompleteness of capitalism in the periphery, and it may even be what tom had in mind when asking about this. but what about occassions where there is a kind of reversion to the kinds of labour processes marx referred to as formal subsumption: personalised command, a lengthening of the working day, sweated labour, bonded labour, even a 'reversion' to labour processes that are labour intensive in small-scale or home work?< Well, I don't see any contradiction between "partial insertion of capitalism into other modes of exploitation" and the formal subsumption of labor by capital that Angela describes above. In fact, they do seem to go together. But it's good to start with a clear idea of how Marx used the concepts before modifying and/or applying them. I was only trying to do the initial clarification. >maybe i am confused as well, but it does seem to me that in marx there is a sense in which the shift from absolute to relative surplus value occurs as a kind of chronological shift, assuming we are talking of say britain or australia. as i said, i don't think there is any need to commit to these concepts as being mutually exclusive. but tom's remarks point to a relation, which i think might be pertinent, between the conditions of structural adjustment and the re-introduction of forms of the labour process which are more akin to the character of formal than real subsumption that marx described.< I don't think that there's a simple linear progression from formal to real subjection of labor by capital. In fact, in my research on the Great Depression's onset in the US, I argue that it's quite possible that the economy's collapse encouraged a regression in the direction of merely formal subsumption. Instead of introducing new technology and the like, the emphasis shifted dramatically to longer work days, fear-driven increases in labor intensity, and lower real wages. The same occurs, it seems, as a result of the conditions of structural adjustment programs. The same seems to be happening (in a more moderate way so far) in the US as part of the whole neoliberal movement. Jim Devine [EMAIL PROTECTED] & http://clawww.lmu.edu/Faculty/JDevine/jdevine.html
