Hostile Brothers

Abstract

It is argued in this chapter that the main overall subject of Volume III of Capital is the distribution of surplus-value, i.e., the division of the total amount of surplus-value into individual component parts, first into equal rates of profit across branches of production and then the further division of surplus-value into commercial profit, interest and rent. This subject of Volume III is clearly stated in the following passage from the introduction of Part Seven of Volume I, which provides an succinct overview of the three volumes of Capital:

The capitalist who produces surplus-value, i.e. who extracts unpaid labor directly from the workers and fixes it in commodities, is admittedly the first appropriator of this surplus-value, but he is by no means its ultimate proprietor. He has to share it afterwards with capitalists who fulfil other functions in social production taken as a whole, with the owner of land, and with yet other people. Surplusvalue is therefore split up into various parts. Its fragments fall to various categories of person, and take on various mutually independent forms, such as profit, interest, gains made through trade, ground rent, etc. We shall be able to deal with these modified forms of surplus-value only in Volume 3.

Karl Marx, 1867 (1977): 709

‘Capitalists are like hostile brothers who divide among themselves the loot of other people’s labour.’

Karl Marx, Theories of Surplus-Value, Vol. II: 29

* I would like to thank my colleagues and co-authors in this book for their many helpful comments on my chapter, both at our Amsterdam conference and in subsequent correspondence, especially Chris Arthur and Geert Reuten who disagree with me the most.