[lbo-talk] Marx on competition

Doug Henwood dhenwood at panix.com
Sat May 14 11:39:23 PDT 2005


Chris Brooke wrote:


>In message <p0621020dbeabd4b2b6e8@[192.168.1.100]>
>lbo-talk at lbo-talk.org writes:
>> There's a passage in which Marx describes competition as the force
>> that commands individual capitalists to "March! March!" Anyone know
>> where it is?
>
>There's this bit of the Grundrisse, which might be the bit you're thinking of:
>
>http://www.marxists.org/archive/marx/works/1857/grundrisse/ch08.htm
>
>*** (In competition this inner tendency of capital appears as a
>compulsion exercised over it by alien capital, which drives it
>forward beyond the correct proportion with a constant march, march!

That too! In fact, that's the one I remember.

It's hard to reconcile this with the Naderish view that there's not enough competition in the economy. Though maybe an ascetic like him enjoys being ordered to "March! march!"

Doug



More information about the lbo-talk mailing list