Labour–Capital Conflict and Permeation of Class in Marxian Categories

Abstract

Marx’s conceptual categories are permeated by political conflicts between labour and capital. There are tendencies to ‘objectify’ Marxian categories where subjectivity of the labouring class is implicitly muted. This paper primarily underlines the class nature of the conflict and how notions such as abstract labour and distribution of surplus value as profits are embedded in a social articulation of interests through markets. The de-mystification of ‘objectivity’ allows us to understand labour processes in the neoliberal age. The realm of production and reproduction come close to each other, and productivity of labour heavily depends on general accumulation of knowledge of science. The rise of the social labour makes political contestations more important in the determination of returns to labour than individual calculus of productivities.