Seventeen contradictions and the end of capitalism

Completed Book Final.indd 2/4/2014 1:15:05 PM Seventeen Contradictions and the End of Capitalism Completed Book Final.indd 2/4/2014 1:15:04 PM also by david harvey The Limits to Capital (1982) The Condition of Postmodernity (1989) The New Imperialism (2003) A Brief History of Neoliberalism (2005) Spaces of Global Capitalism (2006) The Communist Manifesto: New Introduction (2009) Cosmopolitanism and the Geographies of Freedom (2009) Social Justice and the City: Revised Edition (2009) A Companion to Marx’s Capital (2010) The Enigma of Capital (2010) Rebel Cities: From the Right to the City to the Urban Revolution (2012) A Companion to Marx’s Capital, Volume Two (2013) Completed Book Final.indd 2/4/2014 1:15:04 PM Seventeen Contradictions and the End of Capitalism DaviD HarvEy Completed Book Final.indd 2/4/2014 1:15:05 PM Oxford University Press is a department of the University of Oxford It furthers the University’s objective of excellence in research, scholarship, and education by publishing worldwide Oxford  New York Auckland Cape Town Dar es Salaam Hong Kong Karachi Kuala Lumpur Madrid Melbourne Mexico City Nairobi New Delhi Shanghai Taipei Toronto With offices in Argentina Austria Brazil Chile Czech Republic France Greece Guatemala Hungary Italy Japan Poland Portugal Singapore South Korea Switzerland Thailand Turkey Ukraine Vietnam Oxford is a registered trade mark of Oxford University Press in the UK and certain other countries Published in the United States of America by Oxford University Press 198 Madison Avenue, New York, NY 10016 © David Harvey 2014 All rights reserved No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted, in any form or by any means, without the prior permission in writing of Oxford University Press, or as expressly permitted by law, by license, or under terms agreed with the appropriate reproduction rights organization Inquiries concerning reproduction outside the scope of the above should be sent to the Rights Department, Oxford University Press, at the address above You must not circulate this work in any other form and you must impose this same condition on any acquirer Cataloging-in-Publication data is on file with the Library of Congress ISBN 978-0-19-936026-0 9 8 7 6 5 4 3 2 1 Printed in the United States of America on acid-free paper Completed Book Final.indd 2/4/2014 1:15:05 PM To John Davey in recognition of his wise counsel and support for almost everything i have ever published Completed Book Final.indd 2/4/2014 1:15:05 PM Completed Book Final.indd 2/4/2014 1:15:05 PM Contents Prologue The Crisis of Capitalism This Time around ix Introduction On Contradiction Part One: The Foundational Contradictions Use value and Exchange value The Social value of Labour and its representation by Money Private Property and the Capitalist State Private appropriation and Common Wealth Capital and Labour Capital as Process or Thing? The Contradictory Unity of Production and realisation Part Two: The Moving Contradictions Technology, Work and Human Disposability Divisions of Labour 10 Monopoly and Competition: Centralisation and Decentralisation 11 Uneven Geographical Developments and the Production of Space 12 Disparities of income and Wealth 13 Social reproduction 14 Freedom and Domination Part Three: The Dangerous Contradictions 15 Endless Compound Growth Completed Book Final.indd 15 25 38 53 62 70 79 91 112 131 146 164 182 199 222 2/4/2014 1:15:05 PM 16 Capital’s relation to Nature 17 The revolt of Human Nature: Universal alienation 246 264 Conclusion Prospects for a Happy but Contested Future: The Promise of revolutionary Humanism 282 Epilogue ideas for Political Praxis 294 Notes Bibliography and Further reading index 298 308 314 Completed Book Final.indd 2/4/2014 1:15:05 PM ... out in the form of wages to a cashier who uses the money to buy more food Some of the earnings go to owners in the form of profit and they spend it on all sorts of things Some of it goes to the. .. in the British case), their role has been to protect and bail out the bankers and not to take care of the well-being of the people The fact that the United States could statistically exit the. .. not include the contradictions of race and gender (along with many others, such as nationalism, ethnicity and religion) as foundational in this study of the contradictions of capital? The short