A Contribution to the Critique of Political EconomyMarx, Karl
Philosophy
A Contribution to the Critique of Political Economy
Marx, Karl
Economics; Marxian economics
While the general measures of weight of the precious metals served as
their original measures of value, the reverse process takes place now
in the world market, and the reckoning names of money are turned back
into corresponding weight names. In the same way, while shapeless crude
metal (aes rude) was the original form of the medium of circulation
and the coin form constituted but the official stamp certifying that a
given piece of metal was of a certain weight, now the precious metal
in its capacity of a world coin throws off its stamp and shape and
reassumes the indistinguishable bullion form; and even if national
coins, such as Russian imperials, Mexican dollars, and English
sovereigns, do circulate abroad, their name is of no importance,
and only their contents count. Finally, as international money, the
precious metals come again to perform their original function of
mediums of exchange, which, like the exchange of commodities, arose
first not within the various primitive communities, but at their points
of contact with one another. As world money, money thus reassumes its
primitive form. On leaving the sphere of home circulation, it strips
off the particular forms which it has acquired in the course of the
development of the process of exchange within that particular national
sphere, those local garbs of standard of price, of coin, of auxiliary
coin, and of token of value.
We have seen that in the home circulation of a country, only one
commodity serves as a measure of value. Since, however, that function
is performed by gold in some countries and by silver in others, there
is a double standard of value in the world market and money assumes
two forms in all its other functions. The translation of the values
of commodities from gold prices into silver prices and vice versa
depends in each case upon the relative value of the two metals, which
is constantly changing and, therefore, appears to be constantly in the
process of determination. Commodity owners in every national sphere
of circulation have to use gold and silver alternately for foreign
circulation and thus to exchange the metal which is accepted as money
at home for the metal which they happen to need as money abroad. Every
nation is, therefore, utilizing both metals, gold and silver, as world
money.
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