Re: Marx and Justice
On Jul 22, 2007, at 7:04 PM, James Heartfield wrote:
I can’t help feeling that Rakesh gives too much ground to the idea
that exploitation is unjust. I think Marx is very clear when he says
that labour power is paid at the proper rate.
I’ve long thought that Marx was being ironic about this - that labor
power is paid at a “just” rate is just evidence of how preposterous
the notion of capitalist justice is (liberty, equality, and Bentham).
The notion that the value of labor power is its cost of reproduction
makes sense under bourgeois norms, for sure. Why else should we care
about exploitation if it isn’t unjust?
Doug