ABSTRACT

This chapter provides a sort of methodological introduction to Das Kapital. Marx distinguished Vulgar Political Economy, on the one side, and Classical Political Economy on the other side. Ricardo especially linked value to the labour contained in commodities, and he did that in a way that was attempting to construct a coherent value theory as price theory, even though, according to Marx, this attempt ultimately failed. Marx is in fact forging a new theoretical continent. From the author's point of view, it is important to understand that Marx does not break altogether with Classical Political Economy and with Ricardo, and the continuity is important. The Critique of Political Economy is not immediately a critique of capital itself. Marx thinks that reality can only be appropriated through theory, as “object of knowledge”. Value as a Ghost is now exhibited in the use value of gold as a commodity.