Capital: Volume 2

'If wages rise, the capitalists will increase the prices of their commodities'

A vital cornerstone to Marx's overall theory of economics, the secon volume of Capital considers in depth the nature of commodity and the market-place in bourgeois society. Exploring the manner in wich capitalist society must lead inevitably to a 'spiralling movement' of unbalanced growth and social crisis, it argues forcefully that the mass production of goods distributed rapidly around the globe causes wealth to be placed increasingly in the hands of the few, at the expense of the basic human needs of the many. As Marx also shows here, a thriving capitalist society necessarily tends towards over-production, leading to vast economic convulsions. This immensely powerful work argues that prosperity in a capitalist society inevitably holds within itself the seeds of its own destruction.

David Fernbach's translation captures the clarity and brilliance of Marx's original work. The introduction, by Ernest Mandel, explores the position of the volume as part of the wider work, explains Marxist thought and considers its long-term influence.