A Contribution to the Critique of Political Economy
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| Author | Karl Marx |
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| Original title | Zur Kritik der Politischen Ökonomie |
| Language | German |
| Subject | Political economy |
| Published | 1859 |
A Contribution to the Critique of Political Economy (German: Zur Kritik der Politischen Ökonomie) is a book by Karl Marx, first published in 1859. The book is mainly an analysis of capitalism and quantity theory of money, achieved by critiquing the writings of the leading theoretical exponents of capitalism at that time: these were the political economists, nowadays often referred to as the classical economists; Adam Smith (1723–90) and David Ricardo (1772–1823) are the foremost representatives of the genre.
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 economic interpretation of history. 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:
"The totality of these relations of production constitutes the economic structure of society, the real foundation, on which arises a legal and political superstructure and to which correspond (entsprechen) definite forms of social consciousness. The mode of production of material life conditions (bedingt) the general process of social, political and intellectual life."
In English, A Contribution to the Critique of Political Economy is available in an edition edited by Maurice Dobb, published in London in 1979; and from Progress Publishers, Moscow (translation by S.W. Ryazanskaya). Lawrence and Wishart (London), and International Publishers (New York) cooperate in the publication of the Progress Publishers edition. It is also available free online.
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