Capital: A Critique of Political Economy: Volume II: The Process of Circulation of Capital

Capital: Critique of Political Economy, originally published in German as “Das Kapital, Kritik der politischen Ökonomie”, is a critical analysis of capitalism as political economy, meant to reveal the economic laws of the capitalist mode of production, and how it is the precursor of the socialist mode of production. In Capital, Karl Marx proposes that the motivating force of capitalism is in the exploitation of labourers, whose unpaid work is the ultimate source of profit and surplus value. The employer can claim right to the profits, because he or she owns the productive capital assets (means of production), which are legally protected by the State through property rights. In producing capital (money) rather than commodities (goods and services), the workers continually reproduce the economic conditions by which they labour. Capital proposes an explanation of the "laws of motion" of the capitalist economic system, from its origins to its future, by describing the dynamics of the accumulation of capital, the growth of wage labour, the transformation of the workplace, the concentration of capital, commercial competition, the banking system, the decline of the profit rate, land-rents, et cetera. “Volume I: The production process of capital” appeared in 1867 after two decades of economic study and preparatory work. After Marx's death in 1883, Friedrich Engels introduced, from manuscripts and the first volume; “Volume II: The circulation process of capital” in 1885; and “Volume III: The overall process of capitalist production” in 1894. These three volumes are collectively known as Das Kapital.