''A Contribution to the Critique of Political Economy'' (german: Zur Kritik der Politischen Ökonomie) is a book by
Karl Marx
Karl Heinrich Marx (; 5 May 1818 – 14 March 1883) was a German philosopher, economist, historian, sociologist, political theorist, journalist, critic of political economy, and socialist revolutionary. His best-known titles are the 1848 ...
, first published in 1859. The book is mainly a
critique of political economy
Critique of political economy or critique of economy is a form of social critique that rejects the various social categories and structures that constitute the mainstream discourse concerning the forms and modalities of resource allocation and ...
achieved by critiquing the writings of the leading theoretical exponents of capitalism at that time: these were the
political economists
Political economy is the study of how economic systems (e.g. markets and national economies) and political systems (e.g. law, institutions, government) are linked. Widely studied phenomena within the discipline are systems such as labour ma ...
, nowadays often referred to as the
classical economists
Classical economics, classical political economy, or Smithian economics is a school of thought in political economy that flourished, primarily in Britain, in the late 18th and early-to-mid 19th century. Its main thinkers are held to be Adam Smith ...
;
Adam Smith (1723–90) and
David Ricardo
David Ricardo (18 April 1772 – 11 September 1823) was a British political economist. He was one of the most influential of the classical economists along with Thomas Malthus, Adam Smith and James Mill. Ricardo was also a politician, and a ...
(1772–1823) are the foremost representatives of the genre.
Significance
Much of the ''Critique'' was later incorporated by Marx into his magnum opus,
''Capital'' (Volume I), published in 1867, and the ''Critique'' is generally considered to be of secondary importance among Marx's writings. This does not apply, however, to the Preface of the ''Critique''. It contains the first connected account of one of Marx's main theories: the
materialist conception of history
Historical materialism is the term used to describe Karl Marx's theory of history. Marx locates historical change in the rise of class societies and the way humans labor together to make their livelihoods. For Marx and his lifetime collaborat ...
, and its associated "base and superstructure" model of society, which divides human social development into an economic-technological "base" which "conditions"— not determines — the forms of its political-ideological "superstructure". Briefly, this is the idea that economic factors – the way people produce the necessities of life – conditions the kind of politics and ideology a society can have:
Marcello Musto emphasizes this point: "Even the well-known thesis in the 'Preface' to ''A Contribution to the Critique of Political Economy''...should not be interpreted in a determinist sense; it should be clearly distinguished from the narrow and predictable reading of 'Marxism–Leninism', in which the superstructural phenomena of society are merely a reflection of the material existence of human beings."
Editions
In English,
A Contribution to the Critique of Political Economy' is available in an edition edited by
Maurice Dobb, published by
Progress Publishers
Progress Publishers was a Moscow-based Soviet publisher founded in 1931.
Publishing program
Progress Publishers published books in a variety of languages: Russian, English, and many other European and Asian languages. They issued many scientific b ...
, Moscow (translation by S. W. Ryazanskaya). Lawrence and Wishart (London), and International Publishers (New York) cooperated in the publication of the Progress Publishers edition.
See also
*
Critique of political economy
Critique of political economy or critique of economy is a form of social critique that rejects the various social categories and structures that constitute the mainstream discourse concerning the forms and modalities of resource allocation and ...
*
Neue Marx-Lektüre
(German for "New Reading of Marx") or NML is a revival and interpretation of Karl Marx's critique of political economy, which originated during the mid-1960s in both Western and Eastern Europe and opposed both Marxist–Leninist and social d ...
Notes
References
*Evans, Michael (2013). ''Karl Marx''. London: Routledge. First published 1975, London: Allen and Unwin.
*Ruhle, Otto (1943).
Karl Marx: His Life and Works'. New York, 1943. First published, New York, 1929.
External links
*
{{DEFAULTSORT:Contribution to the Critique of Political Economy
1859 books
Books by Karl Marx
1859 in economics
Historical materialism