Nathan, Capital, vol 2 is a crucially important volume. Here I respectfully disagree with Professor Devine.
1. it shows the possibility of expanded reproduction without a permanent underconsumption problem. Naive underconsumptionism is still the dominant ideology of the left. 2. the importance of the gold sector in expanded reproduction intimates the need for a credit sector that can play the same function, and thus throws light on the necessity of credit 3. it isolates the difficulties that firms will have in both realizing the value and finding on the market the quantity of use values required for their individual expanded reproduction. This shows of course that Marx is as concerned with value and use value. The reproduction schema can thus be used to show why the reproduction of capital will be shot through with disturbances. 4. in showing the possibility of the reproduction of capital, the Vol II analysis underwrites the analysis of the capital-labor relation as an ongoing relation that becomes over time opposite in content to its “free exchange” form (chs 21-23 Capital volume I). This is one of the most important dialectical inversions that Marx demonstrates. 5. the early parts of volume 2 introduce the different circuits of capital and discuss turnover. Both are rich in implications. See for example Duncan Foley’s diagram of the reproduction of capital in terms of financing, production and commercial lags in his Understanding Capital. I think this is one of the best diagrams of the movement of capital that I have ever seen, and it is entirely faithful to the Marx of Capital, vol 2.
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