Marx and the Dialectic of Capital

K arl M arx studied philosophy, not economics or politics. Nonetheless, he is best known for his political economic theories, or more accurately, his critique of contemporary political economic thought culminating in his three-volume work, Capital . Some more recent analysts, most notably, Louis Althusser (1965; Althusser and Balibar 1968), claim that Marx’s philosophy is really two philosophies. According to this view, one such philosophy, the so-called early Marx, remains thoroughly Hegelian and idealistic. The second, known as later Marx, Althusser and Balibar identify as the so-called scientific Marx. The scientific Marx, according to these Marx critics, is represented in Capital . These keywords were added by machine and not by the authors. This process is experimental and the keywords may be updated as the learning algorithm improves.