The Commodity as ‘Characteristic Form’

Abstract

In Capital Marx defines all the elements of the capitalist system by the logical implications of and necessary conditions for the commodity form ... Because his argument is strictly logical, it demonstrates that the kind of production that is directed by capital and uses wage labour is the necessary condition for simple circulation. This establishes that capitalist production and simple circulation ... are mutually requiring subprocesses of one system and, as such, are the two processes that constitute the capitalist system. ... the commodity, as Marx presents it at the beginning of Capital, is specifically capitalist.