In the next few posts I will post a close reading of some important works by Marx that explore his concept of ‘abstract labor’. In a past post from last summer I wrote about some revelations I had from reading Ilenkov that I thought helped me come to terms with Marx’s use of the term ‘abstract’ when he speaks of Abstract Labor. Since then, however, I have become convinced that that line of inquiry was not as helpful as it could have been. I had this idea that there was something very complex going on with the abstract-concrete distinction and that I needed to understand a lot of complex dialectical ideas in order to really make sense of what Marx is doing with the concept of abstract labor. And while I do think it is useful to think about the way Marx handles abstractions in various dialectical ways, I now think that coming to terms with his use of ‘abstract’ in the context of ‘abstract labor’ does not require so much extra-reading, as if one needs to read all of Hegel in order to get ‘abstract labor’.

(As an aside, if I could go back and change anything about the way I have pursued my studies of Marx it would be to read less Marxists and more Marx.)

As I mentioned before, I have not been satisfied by my own understanding of the concept of abstract labor. I believe the confusion crept into my mind a long time ago when I read I.I. Rubin’s “Essays on Marx’s Theory of Value.” Rubin questions the idea that abstract labor can refer to physiological aspects of the labor process and instead argues that it is the process of exchanging commodities for money which makes labor abstract, a line of thought that has become known as the ‘value-form’ school. The issue is tricky because one can find passages in Marx like this from chapter one of Capital, “It is only by being exchanged that the products of labor acquire a socially uniform objectivity as values, which is distinct from their sensuously varied objectivity as articles of utility.” Such a sentence, in the past, led me to think that there was a case for arguing that exchange bestows social qualities (like abstractness?) onto commodities and the labor that creates them.

However, my recent close readings have helped me clarify these issues. I read through relevant passages in the Grundrisse, Critique of Political Economy and Capital. The latter two are ready for posting. I may or may not get around to polishing the Grundrisse notes enough to post (I have not had much time for the blog as of late). My main questions in the readings were these:

What is abstract labor and how does Marx make use of the terms ‘abstract’ and ‘concrete’?

How does abstract labor relate to simple labor, universal labor, homogenous labor, general labor and other terms that often appear side by side?

How does abstract labor relate to socially necessary labor time?

How does indirectly social labor realize its sociality and how does this process relate to the category of abstract labor? How is the concept that all labor is abstract related to concept of money as an embodiment of universal general labor that renders private labor social?

As always, I hope that those who have the time to read my posts feel up for posting their thoughts. I always find comments helpful.