The Limits to Capital

by David Harvey

Book Overview

An exciting, insightful exposition and development of Marx's critique of political economy. This description may be from another edition of this product.

• Format: Paperback
• Language: English
• ISBN: 1844670953
• ISBN13: 9781844670956
• Release Date: January 2007
• Publisher: Verso
• Length: 512 Pages
• Weight: 1.68 lbs.
• Dimensions: 1.4" x 6.2" x 9.2"

Customer Reviews

The Truth is the Whole

Manages to clarify the grand theoretical structure of Marx' analysis of Capital without simplifying it. Highly recommended for those who struggled through Volume I and gave up.

the royal road to science

I know that Marx said there was no royal road to science, and stumbling through Balzac references and reports from the chamber of lords from 1849 make it seem that way, but Harvey's book the best shortcut to understanding the vast and rich universe of Marxist thought. It is best read forwards, but always thinking backwards. I never really understood what I was reading until I was somewhere in the middle of the next chapter, and things would begin to relationally make sense. It is fun to see how value, use value, and exchange value play a structuralist game of semantic tag, as you read about chapter 1 over and over again. Since I have read this book, I have done the responsible thing and gone back to read the original masterwork, and it's slow going, but worth it. I think it is a famous fault of leftists to have never actually read all of Kapital. I think I would have joined their ranks, sheepishly, if not for this book.

classic book

In my opinion, Limits to Capital is the best path to Marx's political economy, and in a sense it's an update of Capital. Harvey explains Marx, and introduces some new concepts such as 'spatial fix', 'socially necessary turnover time of capital' etc. Together with Mandel's Late Capitalism, Limits to Capital is the most significant contribution to Marx by a contemporary writer. (The radical geography journal Antipode had a special issue for the 20th year of Limits to Capital.) However, Harvey revisioned some of his thought later, with 'The New Imperialism'. He introduced the notion of 'accumulation by dispossession', I don't know why, limiting the 'reproduction on an enlarged scale', and thereby limiting the validity of class conflict. This imperialism issue blurs all the contemporary accounts of capital accumulation. He is now an Arendtian. Good luck with that, but we miss the Harvey of Limits to Capital.

The most thorough exposition of Marxist political economy in print

David Harvey is actually a geographer, but from reading this book, one would think him one of the great political economists. Based on this work alone, he should be in the popular range of Stiglitz, Schumpeter, Milton Friedman etc., but it is not likely that such 'honor' will ever befall a Marxist theorist. Nevertheless everyone interested in Marxist economics, for whatever reasons, simply must read this book. Harvey's discussion of capitalism from a Marxist perspective is extraordinary clear, sharp and thorough. So much in fact that it is probably the most consistently in-depth exposition of capitalism from every aspect since "Capital" itself. This also makes it hard to review it, since one hardly knows where to begin. Fortunately for political economy newbies (and this book is definitely the best kind of "introductory overview" you could give to an intellectual person), Harvey starts at the same point "Capital" starts, then works his way through. First he gives a clear exposition of the general framework of Marxist theory: the law of value, the differences between value, use value and exchange value, the mode of production etc. All this is done quite well, though there are of course many many such general descriptions available in print. Harvey does seem to skip over the "transformation problem" somewhat, which may annoy those who consider it a major hurdle. Harvey, in my view with good reason, does not. The next two chapters discuss production, distribution, surplus value and its realization and the relation to supply and demand. Particularly useful here are his explanations of the importance of the concept of value composition of capital, and the reduction of skilled to simple labour, where he addresses one of Von Böhm-Bawerk's better critiques of Marxism. The next part of the book is perhaps the core of the book. Here, Harvey delves into the organization of capital, the various forms which it can take and how these interrelate, and the tendency of the rate of profit to fall. He shows how the various manifestations of capital can interfere with each other's functioning and how this creates the tendency towards crises. He then posits the problem of overaccumulation (rather than underdevelopment) as the first 'layer' or 'cut' of crisis theory. After the reader has grasped all this, the second crucial part of the book follows in a rapid manner, introducing first the problematic of fixed capital and its relation to the law of value, and then the role of credit in capitalism. The first is not very satisfactorily resolved and is in my view probably the weakest part of his theory. Alan Freeman has since given a quite different solution to the same issue, but that does not seem to really solve the problem either. Perhaps this is one of the things Marxist political economy has yet to fully solve. Harvey's demonstration of the role of credit is however masterful and extremely enlightening for the many who are confused by the vast array of forms i

A great book to get started on understanding Marx's Captial

I was attracted to this work becaues i'm interested in Marx and have read another of Harvey's books "The Condition of Postmodernity." Harvey is an erudite scholar who's formal education is in georgraphy, but his research has produced accessable and powerful studies beyond his origins. "Limits to Captial" is a complete and balanced account of Marx's economic work centering upon his major text "Das Kaptial." Harvey has does a intense study of Marx and Marxist scholarship (Lenin, Rose Luxingberg, and others) to produce a systematic and dialetical account of Marx's critique of Captialism. Even though harevy pays attention to the importance of Hegelian dialetics this book is accessable to to readers who do not have strong philosophic of economic backgrounds. If your are interested in Marx and/or captialism this is an excelent inroad to begin your studies. A detaled biblography of cited sources is a gem for continuted research. His book on postmodernity is also excelent.