Veblen’s conspicuous consumption and Marx’s commodity fetishism, two theories of value

-- By ThaliaJulme - 03 Apr 2008

Topic: what is the difference between Veblen’s view of conspicuous consumption and Marx’s view of commodity fetishism? What can be gleaned from these differences? Why are they important?

Introduction

He states that it is an oddity of man to analyze social life “post festum, with the results of the process of development ready to hand before him.” (324) “[M]an seeks to decipher, not their historical character, for in his eyes they are immutable, but their meaning.” (Marx Engel Reader 324) Term fetish used with mocking (parallel to the satiric tone in Veblen’s work) In order to explain this phenomenon arising out of capitalism Marx searches for an analogy but he finds he only has “recourse to the mist-enveloped regions of the religious world,“ thus the use of the term “Fetish.” (Marx-Engel Reader 321) Veblen seemed “kindly disposed towards Karl Marx, but ‘did not give us much clue as to his judgment of Marx’s arguments.” (Dorfman 247)

Veblen analysis is historical he is tracing an evolution much like Marx. He states that the current trend is towards more conspicuous consumption. (54) Do Marx and Veblen share a project?

II. Commodity Fetishism as theory of value

A. A theory of commodity

Capital, Volume One, Part I. Commodities and Money. Chapter I. Commodities. Section 1. The Two Factors of a Commodity: Use-Value and Value (The Substance of Value and the Magnitude of Value) “The wealth of those societies in which the capitalist modesof production prevails, presents itself as ‘an immense accumulation of commodities,’ its unit being a single commodity.” (302-3) “A commodity is, in the first place, an object outside us, a thing that by its properties satisfies human wants of some sort or another.” (303) “ The utility of a thing makes it a use-value.” (303) “Exchange-value, at first sight, presents itself as a quantitative relation, as the proportion in which values in use of one sort are exchanged for those of another sort.” (304) Exchange-value is representing as some logical quantitative entity, an “intrinsic value.” (304) The value of a commodity is not derived from the “quantity of labour spent on it.” (306) “The value of a commodity, therefore, varies directly as the quantity, and inversely as the productiveness, of the labour incorporated in it.” (307) “To become a commodity a product must be transferred to another, whom it will serve as a use-value, by means of an exchange.” (308)

My interpretation: use-value + surplus value = exchange value (grosso modo? Marx writings so fucking murky.)

B. Fetishism

Marx: Capital, Volume One. Section 4. The Fetishism of Commodities and the Secret Thereof. From the Marx-Engels Reader.

“The mystical character of commodities does not originate, therefore, in their use-value.” (320) “This Fetishism of commodities has its origin […] in the peculiar social character of the labour that produces them.” (321) Fetishism of commodities thus arises out of the capitalist mode of production. “Articles of utility become commodities only because they are products of the labour of private individuals who carry on their work independently of each other.” (321) “It is only be being exchanged that the products of labour acquire, as values, one uniform social status, distinct from their varied forms of existence as objects of utility.” (321) “To stamp an object of utility as a value, is just as much a social product as language.” (322)

III. Conspicuous consumption as theory of value

Thorstein Veblen and his America by Joseph Dorfman. 1934. Dissertation thesis. For Veblen, the “weakness of Marx was that he emphasized inner necessity, self-interest, as factors in the change to socialism, rather the influence of environment.” (244) “Emulation is the most powerful economic motive, with the exception of the instinct of self-preservation, and in the modern industrial community it expresses itself in pecuniary emulation.” (177)

The Theory of the Leisure Class. Thorstein Veblen

“The emergence of a leisure class coincides with the beginning of ownership.” (15)

“The end of acquisition and accumulation is conventionally held to be the consumption of the goods accumulated […] This is at least felt to be the economically legitimate end of acquisition […] The motive that lies at the root of ownership is emulation.” (17) Like Marx, Veblen finds that the value is derived not from use-value (or the consumption of goods accumulated) but from emulation (analogous to Marx’s exchange value) [think out all this is a little confused]

“In order to gain and to hold the esteem of men it is not sufficient merely to possess wealth or power. The wealth or power must be put in evidence, for esteem is awarded only on evidence.” (24)

“The subsequent relative decline in the use of conspicuous leisure as a basis of repute is due partly to an increasing relative effectiveness of consumption as an evidence of wealth; but in part it is traceable to another force, alien, and in some degree antagonistic, to the usage of conspicuous waste.” (57)

“Ostensibly purposeless leisure has come to be deprecated.” (59) Veblen argues that this is in part due to the “plebian origin” of some members of the leisure class. Meritocracy today. Also there would be no way to square Weber’s Protestant Work Ethic with a society that demonstrates power through conspicuous leisure.

Defining the term waste: “it is here called ‘waste’ because this expenditure does not serve human life or human well-being on the whole, not because it is waste or misdirection of effort or expenditure as viewed from the standpoint of the individual consumer who chooses it. If he chooses it, that disposes of the question of its relative utility to him […] Whatever form of expenditure the consumer chooses, or whatever end he seeks in making his choice, has utility to him by virtue of his preference.” (60)

For Veblen, strictly speaking nothing should “be included under the head of conspicuous waste but such expenditure as is incurred on the ground of an invidious pecuniary comparison.” (61)

Objects or commodities can become so popular as to render them “a necessary of life.” (61)

“An article may be useful and wasteful both” (62) He distinguishes consumable goods and productive goods. Why?

Conclusion

Is Marx’s theory of fetishism illuminating when applied to the reality of law students and lawyers? Veblen is prob more helpful, but he had the benefit of reading Marx. Marx is studying capitalism while Veblen is to a certain extent studying capitalists.

“Veblen presented a direct statement of his mature views on modern vapital int wo essays ‘One the Nature of Capital’ in the The Quarterly Journal of Economics. In the articles he carried his concept of intangible assets so far that he seems to have reformulated Marxian doctrines in the light of modern corporate practice. In Marx the productive agent in economic life is labour, inVeblen it is the accumulated experience and initiative of the race, techniques created by man for human use. Veblen, like Marx, hold that capital goods cost nothing but labour, and that all gain to capital, aside from those going to the working community, are surplus gain, but Veblen maintained that capital goods are instruments of production only by virtue of the technological knowledge possessed by the industrial community. In Marx surplus value arises from the control of the instruments of production by the capitalists, and causes the accumulation of capital with the consequences of increasing misery, the casting out of the bourgeoisie into the ranks of the proleteriat, the increasing reserve army of unemployed, depressions and crises of ever increasing intensity, until the capitalist system collapses. […] Veblen places more emphasis on the age long experience of mankind than on the comprehensive standardized machine process of his earlier work.” (Dorfman 285-6)