ABSTRACT
In chapter 1 we examined the argument for the existence of a substance of value, conceived as an extensive quantity of abstract social labor time. This argument draws upon two broad sites for social theory: the structuring of social relations in the work process, determining the power, or systematic influence, that binds relations among individuals into recognizable structures and institutional patterns; and the nature of the social relations underlying spontaneous market relations among isolated individuals. Both market relations and class structures exist throughout the long history of precapitalist social formations (see chapter 13); but they come together intimately for the first time with the emergence of capitalism. We have, then, the theory of value in general—the theory of the social nature of exchange relations—and the theory of capitalist value—exchange relations when those relations involve exchange within the production relation itself. Looked at from the other side, there is the theory of exploitation in general—a rigorous account of the systematic transfer of a significant part of the social product from a labor-performing, producing class to an owning and appropriating class—and the theory of capitalist exploitation—the same account in the context of "pure" market relations and juridical freedom for all participants, including those that are exploited.
