I have approached Marx's conception of the nature of capitalist society by examining the implications of his analysis of the commodity as capitalism's fundamental social form. My examination has uncovered the initial determinations of the intrinsic historical dynamic implied by his analysis of commodity-determined labor's double character and value's temporal dimension. In this way it has begun to illuminate Marx's category of capital as referring to a contradictory and dynamic structure of alienated social relations constituted by labor. This approach has supported and further clarified my argument that Marx's theory of the centrality of labor to capitalist society is a critical theory of a determinate mode of social mediation; labor in capitalism has a social significance, within the framework of that theory, that cannot be grasped adequately when labor is understood only as a productive activity mediating humanity and nature.

I shall now reconsider Marx's analysis of the sphere of production in light of this investigation of his critical theory's initial categories, focusing in particular on the issues of economic growth, class conflict, and the social constitution of industrial production. In this way I shall elaborate further the understanding of capital—and, hence, the reconceptualization of capitalism and the nature of its possible overcoming—developed thus far.

Surplus value and “economic growth”

My preliminary discussion of Marx's conception of the dialectic of the forces and relations of production sheds light on an aspect of the dynamic implied by his category of surplus value of particular interest in view of the current intensification of ecological problems on a global scale.