Introduction

This introduction presents an overview of the key concepts discussed in the subsequent chapters of this book. This book identifies, with as much precision as is possible, the logical conditions necessary for the complete abolition of the economic category known as capital, as it is defined in the first volume of Karl Marx's Capital. It should be immediately clarified that this investigation is limited to those conditions that are consistent with the further development and progress of human social conditions. Many socialists have long argued that the ability of society to produce an abundance of necessities represents a sufficient development of the social productive forces. The argument made here is that socialists have failed to recognize the central role that the economic communication of human needs must assume in a socialist society and which is made possible as a result of our recently developed information technology.