Course description: The first volume of Karl Marx’s Capital: A Critique of Political Economy, which was originally published in 1867, remains a key resource for understanding the logic of capitalism to this day. Marx wrote the book–which was the only volume of Capital published during his lifetime–to theoretically arm the movements of working-class and oppressed peoples. While the book is long and some parts are quite complicated, every worker can understand it through careful reading and collective discussion. The nine classes of this Liberation School course will help you do just that.
While there are valuable resources for helping work through the text, most of them are from academics who aren’t thinking about the day-to-day concerns of organizers in the struggle. We wanted to do this collective reading from our perspective, the perspective of those committed to advancing the worldwide struggle for socialism and liberation.
Taught by educational theorist, PSL member, and Liberation School editor Derek Ford, this course was initially conducted in the summer of 2020. Each class below a video lecture and a reading guide to help you through the text.
The book is available online for free here. This is the International Publishers version, which is the original English translation of the book. The other main version is from Penguin. Either version is acceptable. The class will generally include page numbers from the online PDF, the International Publishers, and the Penguin editions. You can view each individual class by the links directly below, or scroll down for the complete course.
Class 3: Money (ch. 2-3)Class description: In class 3, we take up exchange and money, where the C-M-C circuit makes its first appearance. We look at how money transforms and arises out of the exchange process and some of the contradictions inherent in the money-form, including those between C-M and M-C, and how these are intensified forms of the general contradictions between exchange-value and use-value. We discuss the origins and value of money, the difference between price and value (and what this has to do with sanctions and tariffs), and money’s role as a 1) measure of value, 2) medium of circulation, and 3) means of payment, and the contradictions between these functions.
Reading guide for Class 3 (Chapters 2-3): .doc .pdfClass 4: Capital and labor-power (ch. 4-9)
Class description: In this class we get at the first definitions of capital, labor-power, and surplus-value. Picking up on the introduction of money into the exchange process and the contradictions between use-value and exchange-value, we begin by distinguishing C-M-C from M-C-M before questioning where the increase in M comes from. Marx says we find it inside and outside of circulation, which leads us to the chapters on the commodity of labor-power. We cover the value of labor-power and identify the origins of surplus-value within the difference between the value and use-value of labor-power. To do this, we cover the difference between necessary labor and surplus labor, before concluding on the rate of surplus-value and the rate of profit.
Reading guide for Class 4 (Chapters 4-9): .doc .pdf
Class 5: The working day and relative surplus-value (ch. 10-14)
Class description: In this class we continue our investigation into exploitation (i.e., the production of surplus-value), beginning with the struggle over the commodity of labor-power and the contradiction between its exchange-value and use-value. We look historically and theoretically at the establishment of a “normal” working day, which leads us to consider the function of the state and the contradiction between the interests of individual capital and the interests of collective capital. Throughout, Marx pays attention to the fundamental role that slavery and colonialism played in the development of capitalism, and how the latter’s development impacted the former. We then turn to relative surplus-value and why its production is the beginning of the capitalist mode of production proper, before considering some of the ways it has been and is produced.
Reading guide for Class 5 (Chapters 10-14) .doc .pdf
Class 6: Machinery, technology, and the class struggle (ch. 15)
Class description: In chapter 15, we look at why machinery provides the technical foundations on which the capitalist mode of production–which has to do with the transferring of the worker’s skill and knowledge to machinery–and look more broadly at the relationship between technology and class struggle. We begin by looking at Marx’s method of critical analysis and providing a contemporary example of how it’s useful before getting into the arguments of the chapter (and how they show up in organizing), which have to do with 1) capital’s expansive tendency both in terms of other forms of production and industry as well as colonialism and imperialism; 2) the reasons why capitalist’s depend on machinery; 3) how machinery impacts work and life; 4) machinery as a response to and site of class struggle; 5) bourgeois arguments of “compensation theory;” 6) how machinery impacts industrial cycles of production and crisis; and 7) the role the state plays in all of this. Throughout, we pay attention to technology fetishism and the idea that technology “develops” and “advances,” and that it’s always a gain for humanity.
Reading guide for Class 6 (Chapter 15): .doc .pdf
Class 7: Surplus-value, wages, and simple reproduction
Class description: This class covers chapters 16-24. We begin with a discussion of “productive labor,” highlighting the ways in which capitalism views and changes labor and clarifying the role that this concept plays in Marx’s theory and in practice. We briefly return to the distinction between absolute and relative surplus-value before turning to different forms wages take and the different functions these have for capitalists and workers, particularly how they can either mystify or reveal exploitation. Next we turn to the circulation and accumulation of capital, defining both and covering the assumptions that Marx makes in his discussion of both in this volume. Whereas previously we looked at the production of capital on the individual level, here we approach it as a totality that continually reproduces and expands. At this point, we briefly revisit productive labor, discuss other forms of labor (including socially reproductive labor), and note how capital increasingly subjects all forms of work–including those not directly productive of surplus-value–to its command. Throughout, we attend to the relationship between economic production, the legal system, and ideology.
Reading guide for Class 7 (Chapters 16-24): .doc .pdf
Class 8: The general law of capitalist accumulation (Chapter 25)
Class description: Looking at chapter 25, where Marx synthesizes the previous sections of the book to articulate the general laws (or tendencies) of capitalist accumulation, this class looks at the different “compositions of capital,” how and why they change under different scenarios, and what this means for capitalists and workers. We look particularly at how these effect wages and the overall lives of workers as well as how capital produces a surplus laboring population (or an industrial reserve army). Regarding this last element, we pay attention to how the industrial reserve army–including the “dangerous classes”–are members of the working class with potential for resistance. We also address why the state changes the way it calculates unemployment and how this shows up today.
Reading guide for Class 8 (Chapter 25): .doc .pdf
Class 9: So-called primitive accumulation (Chapters 26-33)
Class description: In Part 8 of the book, Marx turns to a brief historical analysis and critique of bourgeois political-economy’s “origin story” of capital. Throughout the book so far, Marx has assumed that the conditions of capitalism already exist: a class of those with nothing to sell but their labor-power and a class that owns the means of production (while noting they are not “natural” conditions). Now we discover how these conditions–and the legal and ideological structure of capitalism–came to be: the thefts of land, the repression (including incarceration, whipping, branding, and execution), divorcing people from accessing their own means of subsistence, slavery, and colonialism. Along the way, Marx presents a brief but important summary/overview of the rise of capitalism and the potential rise of socialism, as well as some brief hints about what exactly revolution entails. Noting that Marx takes “primitive accumulation” as an existing category of bourgeois political-economy, we pay attention to how this is an ongoing process.
Reading guide for Class 9 (Chapters 26-33): .doc .pdf
Class 1: Prefaces and afterwords
Class 2: Chapter 1 (Commodities)
Class 3: Chapters 2-3 (Exchange and Money)
Class 4: Chapters 4-9 (Capital and Labor-Power)
Class 5: Chapters 10-14 (The Working Day and Relative Surplus-Value)
Class 6: Chapter 15 (Machinery, Technology, and Class Struggle)
Class 7: Chapters 16-24 (Surplus Value, Wages, and Simple Reproduction)
Class 8: Chapter 25 (The General Law of Capitalist Accumulation)
Class 9: Chapters 26-33 (Primitive Accumulation and Colonialism)
Class 1: Prefaces and afterwords
Class description: The first class in our course on Volume 1 of Marx’s Capital provides an introduction to the structure of the course and the book overall. We discuss the various prefaces and afterwords, focusing in particular on Marx’s method of abstraction. Finally, we address what it means to study the book as revolutionaries by situating it within the need to address the break in ideological continuity as discussed in this document.
Class 2: Commodities (ch. 1)
Class description: In our second class, we cover the first chapter on “commodities,” where Marx begins laying the conceptual building blocks for his investigation. We cover use-value, exchange-value, and value, the two-fold character of labor and its correspondence with different forms of value, and the fetishism of commodities. Throughout, we pay special attention to the social relations embedded in commodities and that, in turn, commodity exchange helps proliferate, as well as how the reality of these relations differ markedly from bourgeois notions of independence, autonomy, and individual choice. In the last part of class, we spend time on the brief sketch of communism Marx gives at the end of the chapter.
Reading guide for Class 2 (Chapter 1): .doc .pdfClass 3: Money (ch. 2-3)
Class description: In class 3, we take up exchange and money, where the C-M-C circuit makes its first appearance. We look at how money transforms and arises out of the exchange process and some of the contradictions inherent in the money-form, including those between C-M and M-C, and how these are intensified forms of the general contradictions between exchange-value and use-value. We discuss the origins and value of money, the difference between price and value (and what this has to do with sanctions and tariffs), and money’s role as a 1) measure of value, 2) medium of circulation, and 3) means of payment, and the contradictions between these functions.
Reading guide for Class 3 (Chapters 2-3): .doc .pdfClass 4: Capital and labor-power (ch. 4-9)
Class description: In this class we get at the first definitions of capital, labor-power, and surplus-value. Picking up on the introduction of money into the exchange process and the contradictions between use-value and exchange-value, we begin by distinguishing C-M-C from M-C-M before questioning where the increase in M comes from. Marx says we find it inside and outside of circulation, which leads us to the chapters on the commodity of labor-power. We cover the value of labor-power and identify the origins of surplus-value within the difference between the value and use-value of labor-power. To do this, we cover the difference between necessary labor and surplus labor, before concluding on the rate of surplus-value and the rate of profit.
Reading guide for Class 4 (Chapters 4-9): .doc .pdf
Class 5: The working day and relative surplus-value (ch. 10-14)
Class description: In this class we continue our investigation into exploitation (i.e., the production of surplus-value), beginning with the struggle over the commodity of labor-power and the contradiction between its exchange-value and use-value. We look historically and theoretically at the establishment of a “normal” working day, which leads us to consider the function of the state and the contradiction between the interests of individual capital and the interests of collective capital. Throughout, Marx pays attention to the fundamental role that slavery and colonialism played in the development of capitalism, and how the latter’s development impacted the former. We then turn to relative surplus-value and why its production is the beginning of the capitalist mode of production proper, before considering some of the ways it has been and is produced.
Reading guide for Class 5 (Chapters 10-14) .doc .pdf
Class 6: Machinery, technology, and the class struggle (ch. 15)
Class description: In chapter 15, we look at why machinery provides the technical foundations on which the capitalist mode of production–which has to do with the transferring of the worker’s skill and knowledge to machinery–and look more broadly at the relationship between technology and class struggle. We begin by looking at Marx’s method of critical analysis and providing a contemporary example of how it’s useful before getting into the arguments of the chapter (and how they show up in organizing), which have to do with 1) capital’s expansive tendency both in terms of other forms of production and industry as well as colonialism and imperialism; 2) the reasons why capitalist’s depend on machinery; 3) how machinery impacts work and life; 4) machinery as a response to and site of class struggle; 5) bourgeois arguments of “compensation theory;” 6) how machinery impacts industrial cycles of production and crisis; and 7) the role the state plays in all of this. Throughout, we pay attention to technology fetishism and the idea that technology “develops” and “advances,” and that it’s always a gain for humanity.
Reading guide for Class 6 (Chapter 15): .doc .pdf
Class 7: Surplus-value, wages, and simple reproduction
Class description: This class covers chapters 16-24. We begin with a discussion of “productive labor,” highlighting the ways in which capitalism views and changes labor and clarifying the role that this concept plays in Marx’s theory and in practice. We briefly return to the distinction between absolute and relative surplus-value before turning to different forms wages take and the different functions these have for capitalists and workers, particularly how they can either mystify or reveal exploitation. Next we turn to the circulation and accumulation of capital, defining both and covering the assumptions that Marx makes in his discussion of both in this volume. Whereas previously we looked at the production of capital on the individual level, here we approach it as a totality that continually reproduces and expands. At this point, we briefly revisit productive labor, discuss other forms of labor (including socially reproductive labor), and note how capital increasingly subjects all forms of work–including those not directly productive of surplus-value–to its command. Throughout, we attend to the relationship between economic production, the legal system, and ideology.
Reading guide for Class 7 (Chapters 16-24): .doc .pdf
Class 8: The general law of capitalist accumulation (Chapter 25)
Class description: Looking at chapter 25, where Marx synthesizes the previous sections of the book to articulate the general laws (or tendencies) of capitalist accumulation, this class looks at the different “compositions of capital,” how and why they change under different scenarios, and what this means for capitalists and workers. We look particularly at how these effect wages and the overall lives of workers as well as how capital produces a surplus laboring population (or an industrial reserve army). Regarding this last element, we pay attention to how the industrial reserve army–including the “dangerous classes”–are members of the working class with potential for resistance. We also address why the state changes the way it calculates unemployment and how this shows up today.
Reading guide for Class 8 (Chapter 25): .doc .pdf
Class 9: So-called primitive accumulation (Chapters 26-33)
Class description: In Part 8 of the book, Marx turns to a brief historical analysis and critique of bourgeois political-economy’s “origin story” of capital. Throughout the book so far, Marx has assumed that the conditions of capitalism already exist: a class of those with nothing to sell but their labor-power and a class that owns the means of production (while noting they are not “natural” conditions). Now we discover how these conditions–and the legal and ideological structure of capitalism–came to be: the thefts of land, the repression (including incarceration, whipping, branding, and execution), divorcing people from accessing their own means of subsistence, slavery, and colonialism. Along the way, Marx presents a brief but important summary/overview of the rise of capitalism and the potential rise of socialism, as well as some brief hints about what exactly revolution entails. Noting that Marx takes “primitive accumulation” as an existing category of bourgeois political-economy, we pay attention to how this is an ongoing process.
Reading guide for Class 9 (Chapters 26-33): .doc .pdf
Class 1: Prefaces and afterwords
Class 2: Chapter 1 (Commodities)
Class 3: Chapters 2-3 (Exchange and Money)
Class 4: Chapters 4-9 (Capital and Labor-Power)
Class 5: Chapters 10-14 (The Working Day and Relative Surplus-Value)
Class 6: Chapter 15 (Machinery, Technology, and Class Struggle)
Class 7: Chapters 16-24 (Surplus Value, Wages, and Simple Reproduction)
Class 8: Chapter 25 (The General Law of Capitalist Accumulation)
Class 9: Chapters 26-33 (Primitive Accumulation and Colonialism)
Class 1: Prefaces and afterwords
Class description: The first class in our course on Volume 1 of Marx’s Capital provides an introduction to the structure of the course and the book overall. We discuss the various prefaces and afterwords, focusing in particular on Marx’s method of abstraction. Finally, we address what it means to study the book as revolutionaries by situating it within the need to address the break in ideological continuity as discussed in this document.
Class 2: Commodities (ch. 1)
Class description: In our second class, we cover the first chapter on “commodities,” where Marx begins laying the conceptual building blocks for his investigation. We cover use-value, exchange-value, and value, the two-fold character of labor and its correspondence with different forms of value, and the fetishism of commodities. Throughout, we pay special attention to the social relations embedded in commodities and that, in turn, commodity exchange helps proliferate, as well as how the reality of these relations differ markedly from bourgeois notions of independence, autonomy, and individual choice. In the last part of class, we spend time on the brief sketch of communism Marx gives at the end of the chapter.
Reading guide for Class 2 (Chapter 1): .doc .pdfClass 3: Money (ch. 2-3)
Class description: In class 3, we take up exchange and money, where the C-M-C circuit makes its first appearance. We look at how money transforms and arises out of the exchange process and some of the contradictions inherent in the money-form, including those between C-M and M-C, and how these are intensified forms of the general contradictions between exchange-value and use-value. We discuss the origins and value of money, the difference between price and value (and what this has to do with sanctions and tariffs), and money’s role as a 1) measure of value, 2) medium of circulation, and 3) means of payment, and the contradictions between these functions.
Reading guide for Class 3 (Chapters 2-3): .doc .pdfClass 4: Capital and labor-power (ch. 4-9)
Class description: In this class we get at the first definitions of capital, labor-power, and surplus-value. Picking up on the introduction of money into the exchange process and the contradictions between use-value and exchange-value, we begin by distinguishing C-M-C from M-C-M before questioning where the increase in M comes from. Marx says we find it inside and outside of circulation, which leads us to the chapters on the commodity of labor-power. We cover the value of labor-power and identify the origins of surplus-value within the difference between the value and use-value of labor-power. To do this, we cover the difference between necessary labor and surplus labor, before concluding on the rate of surplus-value and the rate of profit.
Reading guide for Class 4 (Chapters 4-9): .doc .pdf
Class 5: The working day and relative surplus-value (ch. 10-14)
Class description: In this class we continue our investigation into exploitation (i.e., the production of surplus-value), beginning with the struggle over the commodity of labor-power and the contradiction between its exchange-value and use-value. We look historically and theoretically at the establishment of a “normal” working day, which leads us to consider the function of the state and the contradiction between the interests of individual capital and the interests of collective capital. Throughout, Marx pays attention to the fundamental role that slavery and colonialism played in the development of capitalism, and how the latter’s development impacted the former. We then turn to relative surplus-value and why its production is the beginning of the capitalist mode of production proper, before considering some of the ways it has been and is produced.
Reading guide for Class 5 (Chapters 10-14) .doc .pdf
Class 6: Machinery, technology, and the class struggle (ch. 15)
Class description: In chapter 15, we look at why machinery provides the technical foundations on which the capitalist mode of production–which has to do with the transferring of the worker’s skill and knowledge to machinery–and look more broadly at the relationship between technology and class struggle. We begin by looking at Marx’s method of critical analysis and providing a contemporary example of how it’s useful before getting into the arguments of the chapter (and how they show up in organizing), which have to do with 1) capital’s expansive tendency both in terms of other forms of production and industry as well as colonialism and imperialism; 2) the reasons why capitalist’s depend on machinery; 3) how machinery impacts work and life; 4) machinery as a response to and site of class struggle; 5) bourgeois arguments of “compensation theory;” 6) how machinery impacts industrial cycles of production and crisis; and 7) the role the state plays in all of this. Throughout, we pay attention to technology fetishism and the idea that technology “develops” and “advances,” and that it’s always a gain for humanity.
Reading guide for Class 6 (Chapter 15): .doc .pdf
Class 7: Surplus-value, wages, and simple reproduction
Class description: This class covers chapters 16-24. We begin with a discussion of “productive labor,” highlighting the ways in which capitalism views and changes labor and clarifying the role that this concept plays in Marx’s theory and in practice. We briefly return to the distinction between absolute and relative surplus-value before turning to different forms wages take and the different functions these have for capitalists and workers, particularly how they can either mystify or reveal exploitation. Next we turn to the circulation and accumulation of capital, defining both and covering the assumptions that Marx makes in his discussion of both in this volume. Whereas previously we looked at the production of capital on the individual level, here we approach it as a totality that continually reproduces and expands. At this point, we briefly revisit productive labor, discuss other forms of labor (including socially reproductive labor), and note how capital increasingly subjects all forms of work–including those not directly productive of surplus-value–to its command. Throughout, we attend to the relationship between economic production, the legal system, and ideology.
Reading guide for Class 7 (Chapters 16-24): .doc .pdf
Class 8: The general law of capitalist accumulation (Chapter 25)
Class description: Looking at chapter 25, where Marx synthesizes the previous sections of the book to articulate the general laws (or tendencies) of capitalist accumulation, this class looks at the different “compositions of capital,” how and why they change under different scenarios, and what this means for capitalists and workers. We look particularly at how these effect wages and the overall lives of workers as well as how capital produces a surplus laboring population (or an industrial reserve army). Regarding this last element, we pay attention to how the industrial reserve army–including the “dangerous classes”–are members of the working class with potential for resistance. We also address why the state changes the way it calculates unemployment and how this shows up today.
Reading guide for Class 8 (Chapter 25): .doc .pdf
Class 9: So-called primitive accumulation (Chapters 26-33)
Class description: In Part 8 of the book, Marx turns to a brief historical analysis and critique of bourgeois political-economy’s “origin story” of capital. Throughout the book so far, Marx has assumed that the conditions of capitalism already exist: a class of those with nothing to sell but their labor-power and a class that owns the means of production (while noting they are not “natural” conditions). Now we discover how these conditions–and the legal and ideological structure of capitalism–came to be: the thefts of land, the repression (including incarceration, whipping, branding, and execution), divorcing people from accessing their own means of subsistence, slavery, and colonialism. Along the way, Marx presents a brief but important summary/overview of the rise of capitalism and the potential rise of socialism, as well as some brief hints about what exactly revolution entails. Noting that Marx takes “primitive accumulation” as an existing category of bourgeois political-economy, we pay attention to how this is an ongoing process.
