'Das Kapital' essential?

[Kermit]

Is 'das kapital' from Karl Marx essential learning
Material, for people who want to know more about the basics of marxism?

[motion denied]

Yes.

It's not an easy reading, but not nearly as dense as the legend implies. Just take your time and read it carefully.

[Sinister Intents]

I'm an anarchist and I say a big fuckin' YES to this! Its very important and a well made critique of political economy

[BIXX]

No. It isn't. At least if you're rebelling for yourself and not for a spook.

[RedWorker]

It teaches a lot no doubt, but you don't need to have ever read anything to be a socialist or communist.

[The National Razor]

Karl Marx was one of the great thinkers and theorists of our time. His monumental work, "Capital" is probably the most important and misunderstood series of works ever written about economic theory, useful for anyone interested in the dynamics of capitalism, regardless of political leanings. It is, however, very complex and densely-written, and can be somewhat confusing.

To understand Marx and his signature work, I highly recommend Professor David Harvey's brilliant lecture series, "Reading Marx's 'Capital'." Dr. Harvey's entire series of lectures are viewable online at his website, davidharvey.org.

If you take the time to view Prof. Harvey's lectures, you will know more about Karl Marx and his theories than most who claim to be Marxist, and will also be able to intelligently refute the vast number of idiots who loudly condemn Marxism without knowing anything about it.

[Danielle Ni Dhighe]

No. It isn't. At least if you're rebelling for yourself and not for a spook.
Um, what?

[Slavic]

Um, what?

Anarchists be anarchin

Seriously though, Das Kapital is useful if you want to know the nuts and bolts of how capital functions aswell as the creation of surplus value. It is not essential to know this and be a communist but it helps answer a lot of questions as to how capitalism functions and its relationship with the classes.

[Slavoj Zizek's Balls]

Um, what?

He's referring to Max Stirner's concept of a 'spook'. Spooks are certain ideas that individuals sacrifice every ounce of themselves for and these ideas almost always end up dominating said individuals.

[Slavoj Zizek's Balls]

Karl Marx was one of the great thinkers and theorists of our time. His monumental work, "Capital" is probably the most important and misunderstood series of works ever written about economic theory, useful for anyone interested in the dynamics of capitalism, regardless of political leanings. It is, however, very complex and densely-written, and can be somewhat confusing.

To understand Marx and his signature work, I highly recommend Professor David Harvey's brilliant lecture series, "Reading Marx's 'Capital'." Dr. Harvey's entire series of lectures are viewable online at his website, davidharvey.org.

If you take the time to view Prof. Harvey's lectures, you will know more about Karl Marx and his theories than most who claim to be Marxist, and will also be able to intelligently refute the vast number of idiots who loudly condemn Marxism without knowing anything about it.

I would like to offer a counter-position to the endorsement of David Harvey's works with this link.

https://critisticuffs.org/texts/david-harvey/

This site offers a useful view and analysis of David Harvey's reading guide and is a worthwhile part of one's preparation reading of Capital. In the analysis, the writers attempt to pull apart David Harvey's interpretation of Capital while relating it to Harvey's position on the practical side of 'Marxism'.

Read it for a more balanced take on Capital. Then just go through it yourself without a reading guide first. Afterwards you ought to use a reading guide to patch up things you missed.

Additionally, I have heard that one cannot simply separate Marx's economic writings (including Capital) from his political stance.

I quote:


The Karl Marx who wrote Capital was a communist. He struggled to uncover the possibility of a way of living which he called ‘truly human’, a ‘free association’ of producers who could consciously create a community ‘worthy of their human nature’. He took the work of the Utopians very seriously, appreciating their efforts to envision a new world. But, unlike them, he did not seek its construction according to a plan of his devising. Rather, he sought to reveal the development of humanity within and in opposition to the inhuman way of living which he saw around him, to show how this inhumanity reproduced and hid itself, and to find the way its power would be broken. So his aim was not to ‘explain capitalism’ (a word he never used) but to comprehend how humanity could free itself from the grip of that deadly, exploitative, atomising social power he called ‘capital’. This aim permeates every sentence of Capital.

The attempt to transform Capital into an economics book, pioneered by Kautsky, became a commonplace in the Second International. It was later incorporated into the canon of Stalinist dogma. But it did not go unchallenged. Just as there were people who refused to accept the appearance that the Stalinist political system was an ‘accomplished historical fact’, so there were those who criticised the tendency to cleanse Marx’s ideas of their revolutionary content, and who refused to bow before academic reputations in doing so. However, I do not think they went far enough.

Source: http://www.marxists.org/reference/archive/smith-cyril/works/articles/cyril.htm

EDIT: Apologies for the double post.

[jookyle]

Das Kapital is one of the most important works that have ever been written on political economy and not just for the socialist but even for the non-socialist and the capitalists. There are points in capitalist economics that even the economists themselves did not see until Marx pointed them out in this marvelous his work. I would suggest, however, that if you have not studied basic to intermediate economics perviously that you should read Das Kapital along with the David Harvey lecture that has already been posted in this thread.



It teaches a lot no doubt, but you don't need to have ever read anything to be a socialist or communist.

DO NOT LISTEN TO THIS ADVICE

I honestly don't understand how you could seriously give that advice. You're not helping. I'm absolutely baffled that someone would have the gaul to suggest such a stupid idea. And given your other posts, I'm really starting to think, given the nature of this and your other posts, that your motivation to participate on this forum was for purposefully non-productive reasons. How would you even know you're a socialist if you don't read anything. How could you possibly know what capitalism and socialism are/was/is if you haven't read?

Nothing good, including socialism, is going to built out of ignorance. One must arm themselves with knowledge before they arm themselves effectively by any other means. How are you supposed to build a movement when you won't be able to answer the most basic of questions about marxism or why capitalism is bad. You can say capitalism is bad and exploits all you want but if you can't show it, if you can't explain the ins and outs to someone who demands to know, you will never build anything. Why would any one care about what your saying when even you don't know what you're saying. Not to mention, you yourself are at risk of falling victim to simple rhetoric.

[Q]

Is 'das kapital' from Karl Marx essential learning
Material, for people who want to know more about the basics of marxism?
Yes, it is essential reading because, while the text may be old and the form of presentation feel a little dated here and there, it still is one of the pinnacles of political economy. It takes cue from Smith and Ricardo and develops it to its logical consequence. It is partly (if not majorly) due to Marx' work that bourgeois economists completely abandoned the labour theory of value and developed its 'economics' into the rubbish it is today.

If you're interested we can look into setting up a new reading group with you. We concluded book 1 a few months ago with a reading group of about 5 people. It took us a bit longer than anticipated, but it was worth our time. We also used David Harvey's lectures (http://davidharvey.org/reading-capital/) as a guideline during our studies.

I highly recommend using reading groups, as you motivate eachother and learn from eachother. In our case it even formed the basis for forming the Communist Platform :)

[Ceallach_the_Witch]

it's pretty formidable but it's a really valuable book as far as reaching an understanding of political economy goes. It can be helpful to read it with a guide or something, as other people have pointed out, but it's by no means unreadable. It is somewhat 'dated'* in terms of presentation but we can still learn a lot from Capital.



* when someone says not to read or listen to something because it's dated argh

[Luís Henrique]

Is 'das kapital' from Karl Marx essential learning

There is really, really, only one way to actually know. Do you want me to tell you what it is, or have you already figured it by yourself?

Luís Henrique

[Jimmie Higgins]

DO NOT LISTEN TO THIS ADVICE

I honestly don't understand how you could seriously give that advice. You're not helping. I'm absolutely baffled that someone would have the gaul to suggest such a stupid idea. And given your other posts, I'm really starting to think, given the nature of this and your other posts, that your motivation to participate on this forum was for purposefully non-productive reasons.this is really unnecissary.



How would you even know you're a socialist if you don't read anything. How could you possibly know what capitalism and socialism are/was/is if you haven't read? workers are not going to take power because they read something. People become anticapitalist because of the reality of capitalism, people become socialists or communists because there is a class movement at least powerful enough to raise the question of a new society built cooperatively on working class terms. We only tend to have histories of such movements now which is why subjectively many of us might have come to these ideas through books (though subjective life experience still informs what books seem to ring true or not) or because we just happened to run into socialists or knew someone at school or a job who was an anarchist or marxist of some sort.

What books are good at are passing information. Capital isn't an important book or an effective one at "making someone" a socialist. It is important for people who are interested in socialism and want to read one analysis of the basic general features and tendencies about capitalism in order to help them try and figure out the best ways to rebel against it.

[jookyle]

Being anti-capitalist and calling yourself a socialist isn't enough to build a movement. There are many ideologies and tendency's that come out of anti-capitalism feelings, like national socialism for example. It is not enough to just over throw the capitalists, with out a well thought out and decisive ideology behind it the 'revolution' as it were could to turn to anything. Let alone the problem of a building a movement in the first place when you can't answer questions those you are trying to persuade. The reason why, say, Lenin was able to turn the ear of so many is that he talked of capitalism and socialism from an educated position. No successful revolution has been built on passion and slogan alone. And this is why groups like the Naxalites, who are already violently engaged with the capitalist state have new comers read the works of Marx,Lenin,Mao etc. Knowledge and book reading alone is not going to crush capitalism, obviously. Building socialism isn't as easy as just getting rid of the capitalists. Any mob big enough and angry enough could overthrow capitalists, but that does not mean socialism will happen, as history has shown. If we are not armed with knowledge and history then we are at best rebel rousers encouraging the most reactionary elements of the movement we try to build.

[The Idler]

"for people who want to know more about the basics of marxism" a short pamphlet by Marx was written entitled 'Value, Price and Profit'. It is around 21,000 words.
http://libcom.org/library/value-price-and-profit-karl-marx

[Jimmie Higgins]

Being anti-capitalist and calling yourself a socialist isn't enough to build a movement. There are many ideologies and tendency's that come out of anti-capitalism feelings, like national socialism for example. It is not enough to just over throw the capitalists, with out a well thought out and decisive ideology behind it the 'revolution' as it were could to turn to anything. Let alone the problem of a building a movement in the first place when you can't answer questions those you are trying to persuade. The reason why, say, Lenin was able to turn the ear of so many is that he talked of capitalism and socialism from an educated position. No successful revolution has been built on passion and slogan alone. And this is why groups like the Naxalites, who are already violently engaged with the capitalist state have new comers read the works of Marx,Lenin,Mao etc. Knowledge and book reading alone is not going to crush capitalism, obviously. Building socialism isn't as easy as just getting rid of the capitalists. Any mob big enough and angry enough could overthrow capitalists, but that does not mean socialism will happen, as history has shown. If we are not armed with knowledge and history then we are at best rebel rousers encouraging the most reactionary elements of the movement we try to build.sure from my perspective, a Marxist understanding of capitalism provides the most useful way to be an effective socialist, but I think - especially now - that we have to see socialism as a large umbrella. I might think that the socialist vision and tactics of utopian socialists, lifestyle anarchists, or Stalinists are ineffective and sometime can be outright counter to building an effective class socialist movement, but that's just like my opinion, man. It has to be worked out organically, debated, moments and networks built.

I don't think when Marxists or anarchists are like, "well my socialism is the real deal" it does us much favors. I think Marxism and capital are really clarifying and help me out a lot, but I certainly don't have some key to knowing exactly how we should fight right now or how to rebuild. I have some ideas, I will fight for them, but also want to be patient and ready and willing to be wrong and adapt this or that conception or strategy.

[4thInter]

Most essentianl.

[Dialectical Wizard]

Is 'das kapital' from Karl Marx essential learning
Material, for people who want to know more about the basics of marxism?



Volume I of Das Kapital is a pretty essential read, the first chapter is the most difficult to read so you may want to take some notes.