ABSTRACT

The question of how to integrate demand goes to the heart of our understanding of value theory because it challenges us to decide what it means for a commodity to have value. Marxian theorists take one of three approaches to the question of how to deal with variations in demand—how a change in demand affects the value and exchange-value of a commodity. 1 The first approach, the traditional one, maintains that demand affects the determination of the value of commodities only indirectly by changing the decisions of producers concerning the labor requirements for production. The second approach, which I refer to as the monetary approach, interprets demand as fully determining the value of commodities. In the monetary approach, the market-price is identified with the exchange-value so that changes in demand directly affect the magnitude of value attributed to each commodity. The third approach, which I call the diachronic approach, argues that in Chapter 10 of Volume 3 of Capital, Marx provides a method of determining the value of a commodity under conditions of excess or deficient demand. According to this interpretation demand directly affects the magnitude of a commodity’s value. It does so by affecting the magnitude of labor-time considered to be “socially necessary.” The conditions of production, however, define a range within which the exchange-value can vary. Each of these approaches draws upon exegetical evidence and analytic reasoning to defend the interpretation and each comes to a different conclusion concerning what value means and how value and exchange-value are related.