The aim of this thesis is to examine changes that have taken place within the capitalist mode of production; it is impossible to do this within a theoretical framework that cannot comprehend degrees of historical specificity.2 The mode by which Marx abstracts historical generality specifically addresses problematics of this character. Bertell Ollman and Paul Paolucci identify seven levels of historical generality that Marx deploys in order to understand the relations within and between different systems of the organisation of production. Levels six – what is common to all animals, such as the need to eat and procreate – and seven – what is common to all matter, such as weight and volume – are not unimportant but they can be hypostatised as a given within this problematic without causing too many problems. Therefore, I will focus discussion on levels one to five of abstractions of historical generality.
Level one of abstraction of historical generality focuses on what is most particular and specific about a chosen object of analysis. For example, my name is Paul McFadden and I live in Newcastle. I’m writing notes on Marx’s method of abstraction and planning how best to present it to a reader who may not be familiar with it and in the context of my problematic. I’m using pens and lined paper, sitting at a desk in a room in a building. Thus, level one makes a very narrow abstraction of extension – it focuses solely on concrete activity – and takes the
1 Ollman Alienation 262
2 R.J. Horvath and K.D. Gibson. ‘Abstraction in Marx’s Method’, Antipode, 16:1 (1984). 12.
object of inquiry as the vantage point – in this case its concrete identity as me, with a name and an address. This level of abstraction does not understand the desk as a mass-produced desk but only as an object whose use-value is that you can write on it. So it does not understand the social relations that pertain to this not really being a room but rather being an office, the building being a university building, but only considers them in terms of their concrete reality as objects differentiated only by concrete qualitative identities. Level one abstractions of historical generality also make a very narrow temporal abstraction. An abstraction that captures level one of historical generality focuses on the immediate history of its object, or at least the very near future or the very near past. The narrowness and limitations of this level of abstraction are given example by the circumstance that in the life of this object, at the time of writing the first draft of this piece I was no longer writing notes but was writing, as it were; my concrete activity had changed. At subsequent edits my concrete identity had altered according to the passage of time and the circumstances of my existence had altered. The historical passage of these alterations, and most importantly the political economic dimensions that explain these alterations, can only be captured by moving up the scale of historical generality.
Level two of the mode of abstraction of historical generality is deployed so as to understand
‘what is general to people, their activities and products’ within a relatively definite period of time that can be distinguished from the general form of the mode of production but not separated from it.1 For example, there is relative agreement amongst students of capitalism that three specific phases can be distinguished within the capitalist mode of production.
Furthermore, with reference to the relatedness of the three modes of abstraction, the different terminology which is used to describe these phases particularly highlights the abstractions of extension that are important to the problematics of their proponents. Theorists primarily interested in labour often deploy a distinction between the phases ‘formal subsumption of labour under capital’, the ‘real subsumption of labour under capital’, and the ‘real subsumption of society under capital.’2 Those principally interested in production often deploy laissez-faire capital, monopoly capital, and finance capital or late capitalism as categorical markers for these three phases of capitalism.3 The intellectual history of critical research in Marxism shows that the ways in which the character of abstractions of historical generality are presented is intrinsically connected to the particular problematics of the researchers. In comparison with level one, level two abstractions expand the range of inquiry to more people, to longer periods
1 Ollman Dance of the Dialectic 88
2 The post-operaisti tend to this terminology.
3 E.g. Rudolf Hilferding. Finance Capital: A study of the latest phase of capitalist development. Tr. Morris Watnick and Sam Gordon. (London: Routledge and Kegan Paul, 1981).; Ernest Mandel. Late Capitalism.
(London: NLB, 1975).; Ben Fine and Alfredo Saad-Filho. Marx’s Capital, 5th edn. (London: Pluto Press, 2010).
of time and to larger areas. I am not simply writing a description of Marx’s method of abstraction, I am engaged in ‘production as a specific branch of industry’ during a specific phase of the capitalist mode of production.1 Thus, in the movement from level one of historical generality to level two there is a movement in the abstractions of extension and the range of vantage points that can be deployed, a movement which will become clearer as the discussion progresses. As well as expanding the delimiting points on notions of the identity of things (relations), level two abstractions of historical generality allow vantage points to be considered in terms of their relation to one another as specific categories of a variety of branches of production within a specific organisation of capitalism, rather than as a range of (inter-) relations that pertain in a relatively autonomous fashion between different subjects and objects.
Level two also allows an expansion of the object of analysis from a sole concern for the concrete activity of a specific person to an extension wherein this understanding of concrete activity can be considered as “labour” and whereby this concept of labour can simultaneously be extended so as to understand it as a relation of capital, money, value, etc.; that is, the movement from the narrow limitations of level one abstractions of historical generality to the broader scope that is opened up by level two abstractions allow concrete activity to be considered as a part of a set of relations concerning a specific historical period demarcated by a specific arrangement of the social and technical relations of production.
Level three of abstractions of historical generality pertain to what is common to a specific mode of production. In our case, capitalism, but when capitalism, feudalism, slavery, etc., are spoken of they refer to abstractions at level three of historical generality. Thus, it becomes clear the condition of those more general historical levels must be understood in order to understand the more specific; in this case it is clear that the abstractions of specific level three historical systems must be understood in order to understand their level two variations. That is, in order to understand the specific conditions of variations in the capitalist mode of production they must be considered with reference to the economic, social and political conditions of capitalism more generally. Level four abstractions of historical generality pertain to what is common to all class societies and level five to what is common to human society, to the human condition. To briefly illustrate all of these levels of historical generality together and to show how they relate to one another: I am never simply writing notes but am engaging in work activity that is given specificity by my particularly human capacities and doing so within a specific branch of production in a specific period of the capitalist mode of production, which is a class-based form of human society. Marx illustrates that a contribution to knowledge of social, political and
1 Marx cf. Ollman Dance of the Dialectic 87
economic reality is contingent on the configuration of levels of historical generality in such a way as to focus on what is important to the particular problematic. Therefore, as my problematic is concerned with the production of politics in emergent forms of labour I will mainly focus on levels two, three and four and the relations between them; that is, I focus on the historical relationality between this variation of capitalism, the capitalist mode of production, and class-society. Level five of historical generality, that which is common to humanity and human society, and level one, concrete, subjective activity, remain important points from which I engage with the ontological consequences of labour in the contemporary conjunction of capitalism and the production of politics.
There are connections within a system and connections between systems, a system being at its most specific a distinctive time and space within a mode of production. In this sense, for example, “work” is an abstraction which reveals the connection between systems. It is universal across all modes of production because it is activity which pertains from the powers and needs that all humans share. Therefore “work” can only be fully understood as something that emerges from relations at levels five, six and seven of historical generality, i.e., that which is common to human societies, common to animals, and common to matter, that pertain throughout all kinds of level four, three, two and one historical generalities. That is, “work” in capitalism should be understood as “labour”; labour is a concrete abstraction of “work” in this particular historical conjunction at levels three and two of historical generality, because it is work in relation with a specific organisation of capital, as opposed to work in relation to its object alone at level five and level one. This mode of the deployment of particular levels of historical generality affects the range and breadth of abstractions of vantage point and extension that can be brought into view.