Louis wrote:
>Agrarian capitalism evolved in the 15th century. It is not industrial
>capitalism but it is capitalism nonetheless.
it's important to realize that for Marx, agrarian capitalism can be
"industrial capitalism." At beginning of chapter 31 of volume I of CAPITAL,
Marx refers to the "genesis of the industrial capitalist" and immediately
footnotes that to say that "Industrial here [is] in contradistinction to
agriculture. In the 'categoric' sense the farmer is an industrial
capitalist as much as the [urban] manufacturer." That is, though in Marx's
own categories (the categoric sense), an industrial capitalist is defined
in terms of social relations of production, in the main text he is using
the term in the usual meaning, which depends on the use-values being
produced (manufactured goods vs. farm crops).
Louis quotes Wood:
>We should pause here to emphasize two major points. First, it was not
>merchants or manufacturers who were driving the process that propelled the
>early development of capitalism. The transformation of social property
>relations was firmly rooted in the countryside, and the transformation of
>English trade and industry was result more than cause of England’s
>transition to capital- ism. Merchants could function perfectly well within
>non-capitalist systems. They prospered, for example, in the context of
>European feudalism, where they profited not only from the autonomy of
>cities but also from the fragmentation of markets and the opportunity to
>conduct transactions between one market and another.
This is also Marx's view, BTW. He saw merchant capital (like money-lenders'
capital) as an incomplete form of capital that can coexist with feudalism
and other "pre-capitalist" mode of productions. (see volume III, part IV)
Marx does not define capitalism in terms of commodity markets, the societal
environment of merchants.
>Secondly, and even more fundamentally, the term "agrarian capitalism" has
>so far been used without placing wage labor at its core, although by any
>definition wage labor is central to capitalism. This requires some explanation.
>
>It should be said that many tenants did employ wage labor, so much so that
>the triad identified by Marx and others—landlords living on capitalist
>ground rent, capitalist tenants living on profit, and laborers living on
>wages—has been regarded by many as the defining characteristic of agrarian
>relations in England. And so it was, at least in those parts of the
>country, particularly the east and southeast, most noted for their
>agricultural productivity. In fact, the new economic pressures, the
>competitive pressures that drove unproductive farmers to the wall, were a
>major factor in polarizing the agrarian population into larger landholders
>and propertyless wage laborers, promoting the agrarian triad. And, of
>course, the pressures to increase productivity made themselves felt in the
>intensified exploitation of wage labor.
This is the view that there was a proto-capitalist relationship between the
landlords and tenant farmers (where the latter owned no land). Because the
tenants -- I believe Marx called them "yeomen" (yeopeople?) -- were
dependent on the market for the means of subsistence and for paying rent,
they were pushed by competition to cut costs. (It's a little like, but not
the same as, the colonial relations in Africa where people were forced into
the market (deliberately) by the imposition of taxes that had to be paid in
cash.) This led to a rapid concentration and centralization of property, so
that most of them became landless, encouraging the swelling of the rural
proletariat and the development of actual capitalism.
These days, there is a lot of literature about proto-this and proto-that in
Western European economic history. Proto-industrialism is supposed to have
preceded industrialism by centuries. I'm no expert here, but Wood is
definitely in this tradition, one of seeing social forms in the countryside
that presage those that developed later in the city, though of course her
emphasis is on social relations rather than on technology. In some of her
stuff (such as an article in MONTHLY REVIEW a year or two ago, that I
criticized on pen-l) she forgets the key role of landlords in the process,
to simply emphasize the role of market competition. This "retreat from
class" is bizarre. In that article, she seems to see any kind of dependence
on the goods market (of a country, a workers' co-op, or whatever) as
necessitating capitalist social relations being developed internally.
>This thing called agrarian capitalism preceded [urban] industrial
>capitalism by CENTURIES. It also preceded colonialism and slavery.
It definitely preceded chattel slavery of the US sort, but conquest and
colonialism is as old as the hills.
>... Furthermore, the raids into Africa and the transportation of people in
>chains to pick cotton or sugar cane WAS NOT CAPITALISM. That fell into the
>category of NONCAPITALIST COMMERCE, or what she calls "buying cheap and
>selling dear."
To Marx, this is _merchant_ capital, an incomplete form of capitalism. To
the (large) extent that it involved force it's much more than merchant
capital. It's primitive accumulation to the extent that it promoted
capitalist accumulation.
>... There seems to be ZERO interest on the Marxism list on the subject,
>except for Mine who can barely contain her disgust.
Perhaps people besides Louis don't have as much respect for Mine.
Jim Devine [EMAIL PROTECTED] & http://bellarmine.lmu.edu/~JDevine
