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Cohen, Exploitation, and Theft

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  13 April 2010

Douglas Ehring
Douglas Ehring
Affiliation:
Southern Methodist University
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Extract

G. A. Cohen in “More on Exploitation and the Labour Theory of Value” defends the thesis that the Marxist charge of exploitation against the capitalist cannot be supported by way of the labour theory of value. He suggests an alternative, non-labour-theoretic argument for this charge which depends on premises he takes to be more obvious than the labour theory of value. Cohen claims that his argument (which he calls the “Plain Argument”) is the only way a Marxist couldjustify attributions of “exploitation” to the capitalist, if any such justification is possible. In this paper, I will argue that, given Cohen's objections to the labour-theoretic argument, his “Plain Argument” itself retains too great a similarity to that argument. A new interpretation of the basis of the charge of exploitation is offered which requires neither the labour theory nor that which is dubious in Cohen's formulation.

Type
Articles
Information
Dialogue: Canadian Philosophical Review / Revue canadienne de philosophie , Volume 26 , Issue 2 , Summer 1987 , pp. 299 - 308
Copyright
Copyright © Canadian Philosophical Association 1987

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References

1 Cohen, G. A., “More on Exploitation and the Labour Theory of Value”, Inquiry 26 (1983), 309–331. See alsoCrossRefGoogle ScholarCohen, G. A., “The Labor Theory of Value and the Concept of Exploitation”, in Cohen, Marshall, Nagel, Thomas, Scanlon, Thomas, eds., Marx, Justice, and History (Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press, 1980), 135–157CrossRefGoogle Scholar.

2 Cohen, “The Labor Theory”, 141.

3 Cohen, “More on Exploitation”, 315.

4 Ibid., 316; Cohen also says that “whether or not coercion is inherent in the capital/labour relation, it is neither necessary nor sufficient for that relationship to be one of exploitation”, 317.

5 Cohen, “The Labor Theory”, 156. Proposition 17 in its entirety states: “The laborer is the only person who creates the product, that which has value.”

6 Ibid., 154.

7 That Cohen rests the charge of exploitation on this “creationist” basis is made even clearer by his claim that capitalist exploitation is very similar to the exploitation of the serf under feudalism. In the case of feudalistic exploitation the important premise, according to Cohen, would have the following content: the serf produces the whole product but the feudal lord appropriates part of the product, “The Labor Theory”, 155. According to Cohen, it is being the sole creator of the product which the worker shares in common with the serf and it is this which makes possible exploitation in both cases. This emphasis on production is even clearer in Cohen's remark that “workers are exploited only if they produce something”, “More on Exploitation”, 313.

8 Of course, this theft would lose most of its point for the capitalist if production did not follow the sale oflabour-power. Nevertheless, a similar remark can be made about theft n general. Pointless theft will still be theft.

9 See, for example, Marx, Karl, Capital, trans. Moore, Samuel, Averting, Edward (New York: International Publishers, 1967), I, 176, where Marx says that “they exchange equivalent for equivalent”Google Scholar.

10 We will have to add, as indicated earlier, that this monopoly is morally indefensible.

11 I am grateful for the helpful comments of an anonymous referee from whom these three objections are derived.

12 An objection similar to this would run as follows: No great harm is done to the worker since the worker who receives a wage for his labour-power could purchase labour-power from someone else with this wage. Hence, a commodity of equivalent exchange-value and use-value to that which he has given up could be obtained by the labourer, if he so chose. This objection, however, is not consistent with one important tenet of Marx's model, i.e., that the worker requires his wage in order to purchase the necessities of life. This objection would only have force if the worker had room to man-oeuvre, i.e., sufficient funds to enable him to refrain from spending the wage on such necessities.

13 I would like to thank Steven Sverdlik for this example as well as other useful suggestions.