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UNIT III: Human being is an animal with instrument

Mode of Production

Political Economy H ANIMAL

U
• Political economy is the science which teaches the laws that regulate the production M
A
,distribution and exchange of wealth in human society.
N Instruments
• Political economy studies the laws of the social production and distribution of material
wealth at the various stages of development of human society.
Human being is an animal with instrument & technology, intelligence & creativity and
• The main issues included in the definitions are as follows: conscience & judgement
a) Human society
b) Wealth
c) Production ANIMAL
d) Distribution and C
e) Exchange H U
Instruments & technology
U L
Human society
M T
• Society refers to a network of relationship within environmental supra system, A U
N Intelligence & creativity R
• which is equally applicable in the case of any living being.
E
• The nature of the being concerned shapes the characteristics of the society.
1 Conscience & Judgment

Mode of production
Human 1. Mode of production refers to the varied ways that human beings collectively produce the
means of subsistence in order to survive and enhance social being.
• Human is a member of animal kingdom. He has same physiological functions like other animal. a) Collective
• Human has special characteristics other than animals in terms of b) Production
Desire and satisfaction c) Survival
Freedom of will d) Social Being
Curiosity and creativity
1. Human history could be characterized by the dominant modes of production. In this sense
Understanding cause –effect relationship the term refers to a specific economic system.
Preserving and generating knowledge 2. Any particular mode of production is the result of the distinctive articulation of a system
Skill and technology that involves specific relations of production and forces of production.
Production a) Productive forces
b) Production relation
• The basis of the life of society is material production. In order to live, people must have food,
clothing and other material means of life. In order to have these, people must produce them, Mode of Production
they must work.
• Men produce the material means of life, i.e., carry on their struggle with nature, not as isolated
Mode Production
individuals but together, in groups and societies.
• Consequently, production is always and under all circumstances social production, and labour is
an activity of social man, the fundamental basis of human society.
3 Productive Forces Production Relation 4

What are the factors of production? Means of Labour

• The process of producing material wealth presupposes the following factors: • Means of labour consist of all those things with the aid of which man acts upon the subject of
his labour and transforms it.
1. human labour;
2. the subject of labour; and • To the category of means of labour belong, first and fore- most, the instruments of production,
together with land, buildings used for production purposes, roads, canals, storehouses, etc.
3. the means of labour.
• The determining role among the means of labour is played by the instruments of production.
Human Labour
Means of Labor
• Labour is a purposive activity of the human being in the process of which he
transforms and adapts natural objects so as to satisfy his own requirements.
• Labour is a natural necessity, an indispensable condition for man’s existence. Means of labor
• Without labour human life itself would be impossible.

Subject/object of Labor
• Everything to which man’s labour is directed is a subject of labour. Subjects of labour
may be directly provided by nature, as, for example, wood, which is cut in the forest, Infrastructure /facilities
Instruments
or ore, which is extracted from the bowels of the earth.
• Subjects of labour which have previously been subjected to the action of labour (e.g.,
ore in a metal works, cotton in a spinning mill, yarn in a weaving mill) are called raw
materials.
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Instruments of production
• The determining role among the means of labour is played by the instruments of production.
These comprise the various kinds of tools which man uses in his working activity, beginning
with the crude stone implements of primitive man and ending with modern machinery.
• The level of development of the instruments of production provides the criterion of society’s
mastery over nature, the criterion of the development of production.
Means of Production
• The subjects of labour and the means of labour constitute the means of production.
Means of production in themselves, not associated with labour power, can produce
nothing.
• For the labour process, the process of producing material wealth, to begin, labour
power must be united with the instruments of production.
Means of Production
Means of labor Object of labor
Instruments Infrastructure /facilities
Working People
• Labour power is man’s ability to work, the sum total of the physical and spiritual
forces of man, thanks to which he is able to produce material wealth.
• Labour power is the active element in production, which sets the means of production
in motion.
• With the development of the instruments of production man’s ability to work also
develops, his skill, habits of work, and production experience.
Productive Forces
• The instruments of production, by means of which material wealth is produced, and
the people who set these instruments in motion and accomplish the production of
material values, thanks to the production experience and habits of work which they
possess, constitute the productive forces of society.
• The working masses are the basic productive force of human society in all stages of
its development. The productive forces reflect the relationship of people to the objects
and forces of nature used for the production of material wealth.

 The productive forces are the most mobile and revolutionary factor in production.
Productive Forces
 The development of production begins with changes in the productive forces-first
of all with changes and development in the instruments of production, and
thereafter corresponding changes also take place in the sphere of production
Productive Forces relations.
 The productive forces reflect the relationship of people to the objects and forces of
nature used for the production of material wealth. In production, however, men act
not only upon nature but also upon each other.
Working People Means of Production  “They produce only by co-operating in a certain way and mutually exchanging
their activities. In order to produce, they enter into definite connections and
relations with one another and only within these social connections and relations
does their action on nature, does production, take place.” (Marx, “Wage-Labour
Means of labor Object of labor and Capital”, Marx and Engels, Selected Works, 1950, English edition, vol. I, p.
83.)

Instruments Infrastructure /facilities

Production relations
 The definite social connections and relations formed between people in the process
of the production of material wealth constitute production relations.
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• The definite social connections and relations formed between people in the process of
the production of material wealth constitute production relations.
• Production relations include: Character of production relations
1. forms of ownership of the means of production;
2. the position of the various social groups in production which result from this,  The character of production relations depends on who owns the means of production
and their mutual relations; (land, woods, waters, subsoil, raw materials, instruments of production, buildings used
3. the forms of distribution of products that follow from the ownership of the
means of production and people’s position in production. for production, means of communication and transport, etc.)

 Whether they are the property of particular persons, social groups or classes, which use
Production Relations these means of production in order to exploit the working people,

 Or whether they are the property of society, whose aim is the satisfaction of the material
Production Relation and cultural requirements of the masses of the people, of society as a whole.

 The state of production relations shows how the means of production are distributed
among the members of society and, consequently, how the material wealth produced by
Ownership Distribution people is distributed.

 Thus, the determining feature, the basis of production relations is one or another form
Position in Production of property in the means of production.

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Distribution
• The relations of production determine also corresponding relations of distribution.
Distribution is the connecting link between production and consumption.
• The products which are produced in society serve either productive or personal
consumption.
Productive consumption means the use of means of production to create material wealth.
Personal consumption means the satisfaction of man’s requirements in food, clothing,
shelter, etc.
• The distribution of the objects of personal consumption which are produced depends on
the distribution of the means of production.
• In capitalist society the means of production belong to the capitalists, and in consequence
the products of labour also belong to the capitalists.
• The workers are deprived of means of production and, so as not to die of hunger, are
obliged to work for the capitalists, who appropriate the products of their labour.
• In socialist society the means of production are public property. In consequence, the
products of labour belong to the working people themselves.
• In those social formations in which commodity production exists, the distribution of
material wealth takes place through exchange of commodities.
• Production, distribution, exchange and consumption constitute a unity, in which the
determining role is played by production.
• The particular forms of distribution, exchange and consumption so determined exert in
their turn a reciprocal influence upon production, either facilitating its development or
hindering it.
The sum total of the
 “relations of production constitutes the economic structure of society, the real
foundation, on which rises a legal and political superstructure and to which’
correspond definite forms of social consciousness.”
(Marx, “Preface to a Contribution to the Critique of Political Economy,” Marx
and Engels, Selected Works, 1950, English edition, vol. I, p. 329).
 Having come into existence, the superstructure exercises in its turn a reciprocal
active influence on the basis, hastening or hindering the development of the latter.
 Production has a technical aspect and a social aspect. The technical aspect of
production is studied by the natural and technical sciences: physics, chemistry,
metallurgy, engineering, agronomy and others.
 Political economy studies the social aspect of production, the social-production, i.e.,
the economic, relations between people.
 “Political economy”, wrote V. I. Lenin, “is not at all concerned with ‘production’
but with the social relations between people in production, the social system of
production.” (Lenin, “Development of Capitalism in Russia”,Works, vol. III, pp.
40-1.)

Mode of Production Human society

• Human society is the main locus of political economy. The issues dealt by economy,
politics and sociology- the contending disciplines of political economy essentially
Mode Production stem from the society.
• Because of its undeniable role in human survival production process and mode
production act as the basic forces in evolving , molding and changing human society
Production Relation since its beginning.
• Mode of production is the combination of :
Productive Forces 1. Productive forces and
2. Production relation
Ownership Distribution

Working People Means of Production

• All the issues/components of productive forces and production relations are shaped by
Position in Production human :
1. Intelligence and creativity
Means of labor Object of labor 2. Conscience and culture
• The first one i.e. intelligence and creativity is directly related to the hardware side of
the society while the second one i.e. conscience and culture constitute the software,
Instruments Other facilities although these two are very intertwined with each other.
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Human Social System

Environment
Objective  For production what human needs is instrument/technology
Mode of Production
Factors
Productive Forces Production Relation  Instrument/technology is the product of his intelligence and creativity.
Subjective  Technology is not only a determining factor human labor process and
factors
production system
Human
Intelligence  Along with human conscience it determine the nature of human
(Functional Rationality) society.

Human
Conscience
(Substantive Rationality)