1? Capital ownership and labor ownership
The capital employment labor system is the primary stage of commodity economy and civil society. It broke through the feudal lords system and centralized bureaucratic system, initially realized the personal rights of all the people, and gradually won civil rights through the long-term struggle of workers. There are two basic economic rights of the capital employment labor system, one is the ownership of capitalized means of production, and the other is the ownership of labor. These two rights are separate, belonging to the capital owner and the hired worker respectively. It is these two separated rights subjects that constitute the basic economic relationship of the capital employment labor system, and the contradiction between them is the main contradiction in the capital employment labor society.
The capital employment labor system is formed through long-term economic development and contradictory struggle. Today, when we criticize this system and reveal its decline, we must make clear its progressive significance in history, that is, as a denial of feudal lords, it is an inevitable stage of social change and sublimation of human nature. In the Manifesto of the Productive Party, Marx and Engels expounded this quite accurately: our era, the bourgeois era, has a characteristic: it simplifies class opposition. The whole society is increasingly divided into two hostile camps and two directly opposite classes: the bourgeoisie and the proletariat. Marx and Engels: Manifesto of the Productive Party. See Selected Works of Marx and Engels, vol. 1, p. 25 1, Beijing, People's Publishing House, 1972. The economic basis of these two classes is capital-employed labor, and their legal rights system is based on the opposition between capital ownership and labor ownership. Capital ownership is the ownership of the means of production in the form of capital, and it also includes the ownership of monetary capital used to purchase the right to use labor. However, when it is used as functional capital, it has been transformed into the right to use the labor force, while monetary capital has been transformed into the means of livelihood of the main body of labor ownership. In the capital employment labor system, the main contradiction between capital ownership and labor ownership is capital ownership, and labor ownership is the secondary contradiction. As the individual labor ability of laborers, the labor force can only play a role in the labor process if it is combined with the means of production. Under the system of capital employing labor, workers can't own the machinery and equipment of large industries. If they want to live, they have to work, and they have to sell the right to use the labor force to the capital owners. Although the process of buying and selling the right to use the labor force should follow the principle of equivalent exchange, which is a kind of free transaction, workers who have no means of subsistence without selling the right to use the labor force are bound to be at a disadvantage when selling, which is not only manifested in the price of the right to use the labor force, but also in the process of using the labor force. Since the right to use the labor force has been sold to the capital owner, how to use it, the time and intensity of use depend on the buyer. But what the seller sells is not goods, but labor embodied in others, that is to say, his person should be dominated by the buyer with the sale of labor. In this way, his personal right conflicts with the right to use the labor force, and in order to defend his personal right and the ownership of the labor force, it is bound to conflict with the capital owner who buys the right to use the labor force.
Most capital owners and hired laborers originated from serfs under feudal lords, but the former got rid of serfdom before the latter and became citizens in cities. 15 and 16 centuries, the mercantilist policies pursued by the feudal kingdom for hegemony provided opportunities for these citizens to become commercial capitalists. With the support of the king, they quickly accumulated wealth through commerce, especially international trade. At the same time, those pirates and enlightened nobles also joined the ranks of commercial capitalists. The original class of capital owners was born. The development of commercial capital requires the transformation of handicraft production mode. The former feudal or guild management mode can no longer meet the needs of the new market (especially colonial trade), so the workshop handicraft industry appeared, which triggered the industrial revolution, and the machine industry replaced the workshop handicraft industry. Big industry established the world market prepared by the discovery of America. The world market has greatly developed commerce, navigation and land transportation. This development in turn promoted the development of industry. At the same time, the more the industry, commerce, navigation and railways expand, the more the bourgeoisie develops, the more it increases its own capital, and the more it pushes the various classes left over from the Middle Ages behind.
It can be seen that the modern bourgeoisie itself is the product of a long-term development process and a series of changes in the mode of production exchange. Marx and Engels: Manifesto of the Productive Party. See Selected Works of Marx and Engels, Volume 2, page 252, Beijing, People's Publishing House, 1972. The formation process of the bourgeoisie is the accumulation of capital and the establishment of capital ownership. The original businessmen did not have enough legal provisions and guarantees for the ownership of their capital. With the increase of capital, they constantly forced the king to admit their ownership of capital and corresponding political rights. This is a long struggle process. After constant struggles, including armed revolution and parliamentary struggle, the bourgeoisie seized political power in western countries, and finally established the ownership of capital in the form of law, which was guaranteed by the legal system. When we read today that "private property is sacred and inviolable" in the constitutions promulgated by various countries under the leadership of the bourgeoisie, it mainly refers to the ownership of capital. Capital is a special form of private property. In order to protect the ownership of capital, it is necessary to protect the ownership of all private property and define its subject. This also includes workers' means of subsistence. Although it can only exist in the form of "property" in a very short time, it is also private and should be protected by law. The law is equal, but the private property it protects is unequal. More importantly, the law does not investigate the source of this private property. As long as no one recovers the property forcibly occupied by thieves according to law, it is an infringement of their subject ownership, so the thief's property is also sacred and inviolable.
As property, capital can be accumulated in many ways, including commercial profits, lords' property, pirates' plunder, slave trade and the diligence of individual farmers and craftsmen, which are all established as "sacred" ownership in the development of capital and bourgeois legislation. More specific civil laws and other laws specify the power of capital ownership in detail. This, we can find its model from the Napoleonic Code.
The establishment of capital ownership is the main content of the formation of capital employment labor relations, and the corresponding establishment of labor ownership is later. In this way, it is not that there is no labor force to sell before the establishment of labor ownership, but that there is no legal regulation and protection of labor ownership for quite some time. Although the bourgeoisie was once its ally in the struggle for its capital ownership and political rights, especially in the political struggle and armed revolution, their rights and interests were far less than those obtained by the bourgeoisie. Hired laborers mainly came from serfs and a small number of craftsmen in the Middle Ages. They took part in the bourgeois-led revolution in order to get rid of serfdom, gain personal freedom and then own land. For the newly liberated serfs, the closest interest is the ownership of a small piece of land. The land reform in the French Revolution was the realization of serfs' demands in this respect. Almost all European countries liberated serfs and reformed land in the bourgeois-led social changes, thus a short-term stage of small-scale peasant economy appeared between the feudal lords system and the capital wage labor system. This is what Marx called "private ownership based on individual's own labor". Its historical significance is an intermediate link in the transformation from serfs to hired workers, and more importantly, its theoretical significance provides a basic basis for the provisions of private ownership and labor theory of value.
Both the early bourgeois political economists and the ideological representatives of small producers such as sismondi demonstrated private ownership and labor theory of value on the basis of personal labor. The unnatural force possessed by individuals is labor, which changes the shape of natural objects and produces crops-the main labor products of individual farmers-for human consumption. The individual's own labor becomes the prescriptive basis of the ownership and value of these labor products. When individual farmers are forced to give up their small plots of land and sell the right to use the labor force for a living, their labor force becomes their only private property, and the value of this property should also be determined by the labor force. This is the "reason" that hired workers can rely on when fighting for their own interests. However, the change of production relations and labor mode requires the change and promotion of this "principle", which is the basis and reason for Marx to stipulate the labor theory of value from the interests and consciousness of hired workers, mainly the industrial working class.
By the middle and late19th century, in the process of industrial revolution, capital expanded rapidly, capital ownership was established, and it won political dominance. In this case, the struggle for labor ownership is also on the rise. After a long struggle for unity, the bourgeoisie was finally forced to give in and recognize the ownership of the labor force, which is stipulated in the labor laws and factory laws of various countries. Since then, the capital employment system has really been established. The struggle between wage earners and capital owners based on their labor ownership has also entered a new stage-the stage of fighting for democratic rights. The main contradiction of the capital employment labor system, that is, the contradiction between the separated means of production and the ownership subject of the labor force, restricts the contradictions and struggles at all levels of social economy, politics and culture. The evolution of the capital employment labor system in the 20th century can be explained by this principal contradiction.
2? Combination of Capitalized Ownership and Derived Ownership of Means of Production
The main right in the right system of capital employment labor system is also the main aspect of contradiction, which is the capitalized ownership of the means of production. Forming and ensuring this ownership is the core and subject of the capital employment labor system. Only in this way can capital owners maintain their domination and rule over hired workers.
Capital is a social relationship embodied in things. In the form of things, capital is a kind of wealth or property, but it is different from other wealth or property used for consumption. It is embodied in things, exists in things, and only acts on things as a process. Its real existence is money, and it is the value that money represents. Through money, the value of capital can be shown, and it can play its role in various functions of money, so as to buy the right to use labor, dominate and control workers and all production and operation processes, thus restricting the overall supply and demand of society and affecting social life.
Capital relationship is a special exchange relationship, which determines the position of its ownership subject in the exchange according to the value embodied in the currency, and controls the wealth and labor force of the corresponding value that can be exchanged according to the ownership. Capital is only the concentrated expression and accumulation of labor that marks its value in monetary form. The accumulation of capital is the accumulation of labor, and it is the embodiment of the ownership of the value created by the surplus labor time when the capital owner uses the labor force at his disposal in the capital relationship to exceed the labor price.
With the institutionalization of capital relations, the labor value of capital accumulation is increasing day by day, which is the strengthening of capital ownership and its dominance and control of labor force. The essence of capital is continuous proliferation, so it is necessary to continuously expand the scale of production and improve the mode of operation. In this process, the ownership of capital, as a basic right, can only adopt a new combination, and a new right, namely possession, is derived from it.
From Roman law to today's civil law, ownership is a basic right, possession is the first power of ownership, in addition to the right to use, income and disposal. Ownership is not only a basic right, but also a static right. Its function is embodied in its four functions, which can be said to be a dynamic expression of ownership.
Possession refers to de facto control or actual control, mainly for objects, but also for people. For example, the ownership of slaves by slave owners, one of its powers is the possession of slaves; Although feudal lords no longer owned the ownership of serfs, they still retained their possession of serfs in the form of contracts.
Possession, as the basic power of ownership, is not only manifested after the establishment of ownership, but also before the establishment of ownership. The concept of "preemption" in Roman law is a kind of "natural acquisition mode", which refers to the intentional possession of unowned property through labor or the possession of the property of defeated enemies through force. Preemption, that is, taking possession of items without clear ownership first, is the basis for determining the ownership of the owner, and occupying all the enemy's property is also the basis for determining its ownership. This kind of preemption is not only a "natural law", but also a prerequisite for determining ownership in artificial law. Until modern society, preemption is still the basis of ownership, including the capitalist's ownership of surplus value, and it is also based on the possession of products including surplus value. Only after the product value is realized can it have the surplus value in the form of money.
The more real possession is that after the ownership is established, it is controlled or dominated by the owner. During the legal period of continuous ownership, as long as the owner has specific ownership, he has the right to possess; Whether you can exercise possession is proof of ownership.
Possession is also the premise of the right to use, the right to benefit and the right to dispose of. Without possession or loss of possession, the right to use, the right to income and the right to dispose of cannot be implemented.
Before the capitalist system, or in the early days of the capitalist system, the owner in economic life often exercised the power of possession by himself, and possession and use, income and disposal were unified. At the same time, only under the centralized bureaucratic system in China, the possession of land can be derived from its ownership as a relatively independent right. The country with ownership will distribute the land of the whole country to bureaucrats in the name of vocational field, Lutian field and Xuntian field, and distribute it to farmers in an "equal share" way. And this kind of possession from land ownership, because it occupies the immovable natural resources of land, makes people ignore that its possession comes from ownership. So far, researchers with economic history have directly called China's ancient possession of land ownership.
In the early days of the capitalist free competition system, most owners of capital also exercised their right of possession, use (management), income and disposal. Therefore, possession is not separated from ownership and becomes a relatively independent right. Capitalist economics and law only talk about ownership, including the rights of possession, use, income and disposal, and do not discuss possession and other rights as relatively independent rights.
From the middle of19th century, joint-stock companies appeared and gradually became the main form of capital existence. In this regard, Marx made an in-depth analysis of its rights relationship in Das Kapital, pointing out that joint-stock companies have two characteristics: first, the combination of private capital, although it has obtained the form of "social capital" and "social enterprise" (it can also be seen here that the word "society" refers to the whole and collective group, but it does not mean its class nature, and Marx did not call his theory "society". Second, the ownership and management rights of capital are separated, and the owners no longer engage in business management, but the managers exercise the management rights.
Marx didn't see that when a number of private capitalists formed a joint-stock company, they actually derived possession from common ownership, while the management right was dominated and controlled by possession, not by decentralized ownership-it is impossible and unfeasible for several decentralized and independent ownership subjects to dominate and control the unified management manager. Possession rights derived from ownership can be concentrated by all ownership subjects to form relatively independent rights and corresponding institutions, and it is effective and feasible to uniformly exercise the power of possession and dominate and control the exercisers of management rights.
In fact, capital owners realized this very early when they set up their joint-stock companies, and set up the company's board of directors to gather and occupy power. When it gathers possession and exercises it uniformly, possession is established.
However, neither economics nor legal theory can stipulate this. If more than a century ago, it was still in the stage of free competition of capitalism, and Marx, who had just started the joint-stock company, could only notice the separation of ownership and management rights of the joint-stock company, it was for historical reasons. Then, when entering the capitalist market economy system, joint-stock companies have become the main form of economy, with huge capital and many shareholders. However, when using shares to absorb idle funds in society, the existence of possession rights still cannot be seen, so it cannot be defined by concept.
For joint-stock companies, economists and legal scholars have paid attention to it. The American institutional school, which was formed at the beginning of the 20th century and developed to this day, paid great attention to the rights relations and organizational forms of joint-stock companies from the very beginning, and its so-called "system" mainly originated from this. However, from Van Buren and Kang Mangsi to Coase and others who still support the portal of institutional school, they have repeatedly discussed the joint ownership of joint-stock companies, how the company's board of directors controls the exercisers of management rights, the rights, responsibilities and interests of operators, and the relationship with ownership subjects. But we can't put forward the concept of possession, so that the debate revolves around ownership and management rights. His so-called "property right theory" is mainly to solve these problems, but the inaccuracy of the word "property right" not only shows the fuzziness of English, but also exposes the serious defects of American pragmatic thinking mode.
Is the "property" of "property right" a general property or a special asset? Institutions and schools are not clear. Is the "right" of "property right" ownership, or the right of possession, management and income? The institutional school is not clear.
Although the institutional school can't explain that the capitalized ownership of the means of production comes from joint-stock companies or joint-stock systems, which leads to the change of the capital ownership relationship, they are concerned about this issue after all and try to explain the various relationships between them. The so-called "neo-classical comprehensive school", which calls itself the "mainstream school", dismisses this and resolutely uses advanced mathematics to calculate the "principle" put forward by Marshall and Keynes more than 100 years ago and more than 60 years ago. As long as we can work out a certain rule or even a formula, we will celebrate each other. In their view, private ownership of capital is absolute and eternal, and it cannot and should not be changed. The "property right theory" of the institutional school is redundant, and what the non-mainstream school wants to do is the "handyman" work in economics.
Economists under the banner of "Marxism" should certainly pay attention to this change of capitalist ownership, but because there is no concept of "possession" in existing economics textbooks or Marx's works, they can't summarize the main points or main contradictions of this change. Except that some people still talk about capital ownership by the relationship between ownership and management right, a relatively new understanding is to put forward a concept of "corporate capital", and then derive two concepts of "corporate capital ownership" and "corporate capital ownership". In civil law, a legal person is a civil subject relative to a natural person. It has three characteristics: first, a specific organization; Second, it has independent property; Third, bear the property responsibility alone. "Corporate capital" refers to enterprises and institutions in the fields of production, circulation and finance.
Because company capital has two characteristics: independent property and independent property responsibility, some researchers put forward the concept of "company capital ownership", that is, company capital is recognized as the main body of ownership. From this, the concept of "corporate capital ownership" is obtained.
Corporate capital exists, but the enterprises and institutions embodied by corporate capital are not the subject of ownership, so the ownership of corporate capital cannot be established.
Legal person organization is actually an institution derived from capital ownership and exercising its possession power. The right of a legal person organization to the capital accumulated by shares or funds is possession, not ownership.
Corporate capital is a combination of several private capitals, and it is also a form in which the ownership of these capitals can be concentrated. When private capital owners invest in joint-stock companies, foundations and other corporate organizations, they do not give up their ownership, or they do not directly invest in ownership, but invest in possession derived from ownership to integrate the rights of corporate organizations. In this way, the owner still retains the right to dominate and control the legal person organization, which is guaranteed by the corresponding laws and can recover the possession of all its capital and withdraw from the legal person organization.
As an institution that assembles and exercises the right of possession derived from ownership, a legal person organization should be responsible to the subject of ownership on the one hand, and derive the right of management from the right of possession on the other hand, choose the operator, sign a business contract, and hand over the right to use the occupied funds to the exerciser of the right of management, who is responsible for the business activities. The legal person organization shall, while ensuring the operators to operate independently in accordance with the contract, conduct necessary supervision, inspect and accept their operating results in accordance with the contract, and make corresponding rewards and punishments.
Legal person organizations are often established in the form of a board of directors with a board of supervisors. Of course, names will change, but their nature and function are basically the same.
Capital possession embodied in corporate capital and its organization is the main feature of modern capitalist economic relations and systems. The concept of possession can not only clarify the nature of modern capital system, but also recognize its position and role in the capitalist market economy system. The capital in the capitalist market economy system is not mainly private capital owned by natural persons. However, the possession of enterprise capital comes from the private capital ownership of natural persons. Although private capital is operated by its own owners or enterprises that insist on entrusting others to operate still exist, it is no longer the main body of economic life.
3? Establish and strengthen labor ownership
Capital is only the relationship between the purchase and use of the right to use labor formed by the accumulation of the value created by non-labor owners in the past. In this relationship, the leader is the subject of capital ownership and the passive is the subject of labor ownership. However, because workers can't survive without selling the right to use the labor force, they also actively, consciously and even freely sell the right to use the labor force. When selling the right to use the labor force, the owner of the labor force and the owner of the capital have an equal exchange relationship. When capital owners unite capital in the form of joint-stock companies, labor owners also further unite to form trade unions on the basis of strengthening labor ownership awareness, forming social forces opposed to capital owners and safeguarding their own interests through constant struggle.
The concept of labor ownership is clearly defined by Marx in Das Kapital, and it is regarded as an important category in the analysis of capital relations. According to Marx's viewpoint, capital relations are essentially the unity of opposites between capital ownership and labor ownership. The separation of ownership of the means of production and the ownership of the labor force, or that the workers themselves do not have the necessary means of production and do not have the conditions for labor to create value. In order to make a living, he had to sell his sole right to use labor as a commodity to the capital owner.
The ownership of labor force is the basis of the existence of laborers in capital relations, and the quality and quantity of labor force is the strength of its ownership, which is the same as the monetary quantity of capital. The exchange between capital and labor ownership subjects is an equal exchange between free rights subjects according to the general principles of commodity economy. They enter into contracts as free and legally equal people. The contract is the final result of their will being legally expressed. The strength of the labor force depends on the quality and skills of the workers themselves, as well as the unity of the workers. The two are complementary. The improvement of workers' personal quality and skills may make them more competitive than other workers in selling the right to use the labor force and can sell at a higher price. When competing with capitalists, individual workers are obviously in a weak position, especially they only care about their own interests, compete with each other and crowd out each other. At present, the employees of private enterprises in China are often bound by their own small-scale peasant consciousness, selfish and self-satisfied. "Sweep away the snow in front of each house, regardless of others' frost. "Therefore, when selling the right to use the labor force, they are often pushed down by buyers, especially when their colleagues are bullied by the boss, they can't come forward to help, and even feel lucky. What is even more frightening is that colleagues crowd out each other, seemingly seeking self-interest, but actually harming others.
Although there is no tradition of small-scale peasant consciousness in Europe, there is competition and crowding out among hired workers when the capital employment system has just been established. At that time, the intensity of workers' labor, the length of labor time (as long as 16- 18 hours) and the low price of labor were not only related to the quality and skill level of workers, but also related to the mutual exclusion of sellers of labor use rights. Engels described the situation at that time in his book The Situation of the Working Class in Britain.
Labor ownership is a basic right in the exchange relationship between capital and labor use right, but only when workers realize this right and make it clear in law through their own struggle, and then unite to fight against the subject of capital ownership on the basis of labor ownership, the basic rights that workers depend on for survival in modern society can be truly established, and democratic rights can be derived from it.
Economic rights are the definition of people's position and interests in economic relations. When an economic relationship is formed, its corresponding rights have already met the conditions. However, as a legal form to adjust economic relations, rights must have clear legal provisions, and the other is the clear consciousness and efforts of the subject of rights, in order to really play a role in economic life.
As long as there is an employment relationship in economic life, the ownership of the labor force has already appeared, but it is clearly stipulated in the law. Its subject's understanding of it and the use of corresponding laws to safeguard their rights and interests are all after the capital relationship has become the dominant economic relationship, that is, the establishment of the capital employment labor system. Western Europe and the United States started after the19th century, and other countries started later. The Labor Law and the Factory Law, which stipulate labor ownership and workers' related rights, have also been promulgated one after another, and have been constantly revised. Although these laws generally focus on safeguarding the interests of capitalists, they recognize the rights of workers and enable them to fight for and protect their own interests according to the rights of labor ownership.
At the same time, representatives of workers' thoughts, especially Marx, have repeatedly demonstrated workers' rights in theory, and thus put forward a systematic theory of class contradictions and struggles between the working class and the bourgeoisie. In a certain sense, Das Kapital is a theoretical expression of the struggle between hired workers and capital rule based on labor ownership.
In contrast, a highly skilled labor force can not only sell at a higher price, but also be in a favorable position when exchanging with buyers; Low-skilled labor, not only the price of its right to use is relatively low, but also it is often at a disadvantage when exchanging with buyers.
Because of this, in order to survive better and improve some social status, the only way to raise the price of the right to use their labor force in the labor market is to improve the quality of their labor force, that is, quality skills. From the individual point of view, technical quality is the main content of the labor force, and it is the driving force for workers to receive education and training and improve their skills; On the whole, not only the skill quality, but also the cultural and spiritual quality are very important contents, and its main performance is the enhancement of class consciousness.
Individual and collective workers have inherent requirements to improve their own quality and skills, so education and training will be taken as an important content when exercising the democratic rights derived from labor ownership. Socialist political parties and trade unions have made considerable efforts in this regard, thus promoting the gradual improvement of public education. First, primary education, then secondary education, and then higher education-now Germany and other western and Nordic countries have free exams all the time-free education is the result of long-term struggle of workers. At the same time, the trade union also negotiates with the employer about the training of employees, because it is also beneficial to capital owners, so it can also be widely carried out in enterprises.
The improvement of workers' quality and skills is not only the result of individual subjective efforts, but also the result of the accumulation and exchange of experience of the whole workers, especially in the research of technological innovation and innovation. Because this does not conflict with the capital owner, even the employers and employees are unified, in order to occupy the relative surplus value as much as possible, the capital owner will also invest a sum of money in the development of new technologies or purchase patents, and implement them in enterprises. In this way, it also provides necessary conditions for workers to improve their quality and skills.