The Contradiction between Use-Value and Exchange-Value: Ecology, Imperialism, and the Telos of Production

Authors

Larry Alan Busk, Florida Gulf Coast UniversityFollow
Elizabeth Portella, Florida Gulf Coast UniversityFollow

ORCID

https://orcid.org/0000-0002-1120-4274

https://orcid.org/0000-0002-9435-2140

Keywords

Capitalism, Climate Change, Imperialism, Value

Document Type

Peer-Reviewed Research Article

Abstract

This article elaborates and defends a critique of capitalism which, despite its appearance in various bodies of work, has not been named or systematically differentiated. The critique locates a contradiction between production for use-value and production for exchange-value, or a contradiction in what we call “the telos of production.” While maintaining that it has some basis in Marx’s work, we defend this model as preferable to the critique of capitalism based strictly on the exploitation of labor (which we call the “exploitation-exclusive critique”). We attempt to show this by applying the two approaches to the empirical realities of the ecological crisis and ongoing imperialist relations. It is not necessary, however, to abandon the critique of exploitation, or various other criticisms of the capitalist system: we claim that the telos of production critique is the most general diagnosis of capitalism and is capable of incorporating the other major critiques.

Recommended Citation

Busk, Larry Alan and Portella, Elizabeth (2024) "The Contradiction between Use-Value and Exchange-Value: Ecology, Imperialism, and the Telos of Production," Emancipations: A Journal of Critical Social Analysis: Vol. 3: Iss. 1, Article 3.
Available at: https://scholarsjunction.msstate.edu/emancipations/vol3/iss1/3