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juanpablo_85 's review for:
The book is so large & thorough that any review cannot really do it justice. As a friend said to me when we were discussing the book, "We're all loosely familiar with capitalism but it sounds like this book takes your hand & walks you door to door." (Loosely quoted) And that, indeed, it does. It is a thorough breakdown & explanation of capital & how it functions in our world. It describes the ins & outs, it's functions, the social relation of it between capitalist & laborer, the social conditions it produces in society as a result and much more.
The first 3 chapters are challenging & I've read that people usually quit reading it because of them but if you can get through them, the rest of the book is a breeze. They do help with understanding the rest of the book but aren't necessary to do so. I've even read suggestions of reading it out of order or reading specific chapters to get the gist of the book.
Marx explains the difference between where the capitalist starts off & where the laborer starts off & in the formula it is immediately obvious why people are stuck in their respective cycles. The capitalist gets more for less out of the worker. Workers demands & wages are kept in check by the constant surplus of workers in general to drive wages down & full employment is never allowed to happen & can't happen by design. There is a great breakdown of how the worker is exploited & pushed to create surplus value & how the time spent working is not just for their means of subsistence. Wages are intentionally kept below what one ultimately needs to survive, otherwise why would we work so much? We are always operating at a loss. That different groups are pitted against each other or divided via various forms of oppression of given attention as well. The typical comment on these divisions is that to focus on them is to do so st the expense of understanding class warfare as if the oppressed & a more privileged group operate on equal footing (they don't) & any criticism pointing out issues the more oppressed group should be a lesson to the more privileged to acknowledge how they feed into this oppression & do the dirty work of the oppressors & should find ways to cease & remedy that but I seldom see that acknowledged adequately but that is an issue in & of itself.
Marx provides numerous example throughout history as it pertains to feudalism, slavery & colonialism & the roles they play in either the creation of capitalist economies or its maintenance. There is attention given to the general conditions of poverty capitalism creates via historical examples in Ireland & England. The overcrowding, malnutrition, disease, creation of large families in these conditions that can't hope to have enough but create more workers for the machine. I do think Marx underestimated the ability of the oppressors to keep the masses ignorant & thus unable to mobilize.
It is an important read in order to understand the tether forced upon us. It's honestly left me even more disgusted with society, this world, as it currently functions. Any hope for change must come not from reform but from a new society. If & when that will happen, remains to be seen. It's a lot but worth the time & effort.
The first 3 chapters are challenging & I've read that people usually quit reading it because of them but if you can get through them, the rest of the book is a breeze. They do help with understanding the rest of the book but aren't necessary to do so. I've even read suggestions of reading it out of order or reading specific chapters to get the gist of the book.
Marx explains the difference between where the capitalist starts off & where the laborer starts off & in the formula it is immediately obvious why people are stuck in their respective cycles. The capitalist gets more for less out of the worker. Workers demands & wages are kept in check by the constant surplus of workers in general to drive wages down & full employment is never allowed to happen & can't happen by design. There is a great breakdown of how the worker is exploited & pushed to create surplus value & how the time spent working is not just for their means of subsistence. Wages are intentionally kept below what one ultimately needs to survive, otherwise why would we work so much? We are always operating at a loss. That different groups are pitted against each other or divided via various forms of oppression of given attention as well. The typical comment on these divisions is that to focus on them is to do so st the expense of understanding class warfare as if the oppressed & a more privileged group operate on equal footing (they don't) & any criticism pointing out issues the more oppressed group should be a lesson to the more privileged to acknowledge how they feed into this oppression & do the dirty work of the oppressors & should find ways to cease & remedy that but I seldom see that acknowledged adequately but that is an issue in & of itself.
Marx provides numerous example throughout history as it pertains to feudalism, slavery & colonialism & the roles they play in either the creation of capitalist economies or its maintenance. There is attention given to the general conditions of poverty capitalism creates via historical examples in Ireland & England. The overcrowding, malnutrition, disease, creation of large families in these conditions that can't hope to have enough but create more workers for the machine. I do think Marx underestimated the ability of the oppressors to keep the masses ignorant & thus unable to mobilize.
It is an important read in order to understand the tether forced upon us. It's honestly left me even more disgusted with society, this world, as it currently functions. Any hope for change must come not from reform but from a new society. If & when that will happen, remains to be seen. It's a lot but worth the time & effort.