Marx ’ s Theory of Productive and Unproductive Labour 47

This essay will attempt, first and foremost, a definitive exposition of Marx’s theory of productive and unproductive labour.1 This theory is presented in the three volumes of Capital and in Theories of Surplus Value—Marx’s projected historico-critical fourth volume.2 This seems useful and necessary for several reasons. First, as one of the most suspect legacies of classical political economy, its importance in Marxist political economy is disputed.3 As a result, it has not been accorded a central place in most expositions of Marx’s political economy, and its relation to the fundamental concept of surplus value has not been sufficiently emphasized.4 To anticipate, if the essential problem for Marx in his mature economic writings was the explanation of surplus value under capitalism, then, on any count, the distinction between productive labour which creates surplus value, and unproductive labour much of which is supported out of surplus value—this distinction is a critical one. Its analysis is the more urgent since several Marxist writers, notably Baran,5 have recently reinterpreted the concept in the course of focusing on the disposal and absorption of the surplus under Marx’s Theory of Productive and Unproductive Labour