The Deduction of the Relations among Nature, Labor, and Capital in *Capital* and Its Manuscripts

*Capital* and its manuscripts contain a deductive analysis of the relations among nature, labor, and capital. In the context of *Capital* and its manuscripts, Marx, through a detailed examination of the alienation of proletarian labor and the decay of the natural world in the industrial production society dominated by capital, presents the historical axis of human social development as the unity of opposites and dynamic interweaving of the relations among nature, labor, and capital. The institutional deduction and value thread within this run from the fundamental opposition of the relations among nature, labor, and capital in capitalist society to the coordinated unity of these relations in socialist society. The coordinated unity of the relations among nature, labor, and capital in socialist society is a necessity of historical development, the value appeal of the ecological outlook of Chinese-path modernization, and the guiding principle for building a modernization in which humanity and nature coexist harmoniously.

《资本论》及其手稿中蕴含着对自然、劳动与资本关系的演绎性分析。在《资本论》及其手稿语境中，马克思通过详尽考察由资本主控的工业生产社会中无产阶级的劳动异化状况和自然界衰败状态，将人类社会发展的历史轴线呈现为自然、劳动与资本关系的对立统一、动态交织，其中的制度推演和价值主线是从资本主义社会自然、劳动与资本关系的根本对立走向社会主义社会自然、劳动与资本关系的协调统一。社会主义社会自然、劳动与资本关系的协调统一是历史发展的必然，是中国式现代化生态观的价值诉求，也是人与自然和谐共生现代化的建设遵循。

I. Nature as Prior, Labor as Interactive, Capital as Aggregative: From Separation to Combination

一、自然先在、劳动互动、资本集合：从分离到结合

The movement from separation to combination is the generative dimension of the deductive analysis of the relations among nature, labor, and capital in *Capital* and its manuscripts. Within the positive-feedback cycle of these three factors, setting aside the special cloak of any social system, nature, labor, and capital are all factors of production. Nature’s natural presence supplies the indispensable natural elements of labor, which Marx calls “the primary source of all instruments and objects of labor.” [1]1 Marx, *Capital*, Vol. 1, referring to the idea that nature is the primary source of the material elements of labor. Labor, in accordance with the activities necessary for human survival and development, utilizes and alters the forms of natural matter; that is, nature and labor together constitute the basic conditions of human society and its production. Capital, which emerges under specific historical conditions and is not eternal, has as one of its historical functions the effective connection of dispersed individual labor and all factors of production, including natural resources, thereby making large-scale socialized production possible.

从分离走向结合是《资本论》及其手稿对自然、劳动与资本关系演绎分析的生成性层面。在三者正反馈关系循环圈中，撇开一切社会制度的特殊外衣，自然、劳动与资本都是生产的因素。自然的天然在场供给劳动不可或缺的自然要素，马克思将其称为“一切劳动资料和劳动对象的第一源泉”。劳动按照对人类生存和发展必需的活动利用和改变自然物质的形态，即自然与劳动共同构成人类社会及其生产的基础条件。作为一定历史条件下出现的、非永恒的资本，其历史性作用之一在于，将分散的个人劳动以及一切包括自然资源在内的生产要素有效地连接起来，使社会化大生产成为可能。

1. Nature as a “Prior Existence”

1.作为“优先性存在”的自然

“Nature” is the foundational concept in the deduction of the relations among nature, labor, and capital. To conduct a deductive analysis of the relations among these three, one must first affirm “the priority of external nature.” [2]2 Marx and Engels, *The German Ideology*. From the perspective of capitalist industrial civilization, Marx once held that 18th-century old materialism had already resolved this issue, and that the focus should not be here but rather on the question of humanity’s transformation of nature from a practical standpoint. Accordingly, Marx defined his new materialism as “practical materialism.” The theoretical starting point of “practical materialism” is human perceptual practical activity itself, not external nature. However, after witnessing the fact that capitalist production had caused a comprehensive alienation of the relation between humanity and nature, Marx realized that labor practice could not be defined by setting aside “the natural conditions of production,” because “without nature, without the sensuous external world, the worker can create nothing.” [3]3 Marx, *Economic and Philosophic Manuscripts of 1844*. On the one hand, nature supplies the means of production for labor, i.e., the objects of labor that labor realizes; on the other hand, it supplies the means of subsistence that sustain the physical existence of the laborer. In this sense, external nature is something more fundamental than labor practice. Accordingly, Marx pointed out: “It is wrong to think that labor, insofar as it creates use-values, is the sole source of the wealth it creates, i.e., of material wealth. Since it is an activity that adapts matter to this or that purpose, it requires matter as a precondition. In different use-values, the proportions between labor and natural matter vary greatly, but use-value always has a natural substrate.” [4]4 Marx, *A Contribution to the Critique of Political Economy*. That is to say, no matter what role labor practice plays in the existence and development of humanity, or in the creation and accumulation of the wealth of human society, “the priority of external nature” is always maintained.

“自然”是自然、劳动与资本关系演绎中的基石性概念。要进行三者关系的演绎分析，必须首先肯定“外部自然界的优先地位”。马克思曾驻足于资本主义工业文明视角认为，18世纪的旧唯物主义已解决了此问题，其旨趣不应在此，而应从实践角度探讨人对自然的改造问题。据此，马克思将其新唯物主义定义为“实践唯物主义”。“实践唯物主义”的理论基点是人的感性实践活动本身而非外在自然。然而，在目睹了资本主义生产造成人与自然关系全面异化的事实后，马克思意识到，不能抛开“生产的自然条件”来界定劳动实践，因为“没有自然界，没有感性的外部世界，工人什么也不能创造”。自然界一方面供给劳动的生产资料即劳动实现的劳动对象；另一方面供给维持劳动者肉体生存的生活资料。在这个意义上，外部自然界是比劳动实践更为基础的东西。据此，马克思指出：“如果认为，劳动就它创造使用价值来说，是它所创造的东西即物质财富的唯一源泉，那就错了。既然它是使物质适应于这种或那种目的的活动，它就要有物质作为前提。在不同的使用价值中，劳动和自然物质之间的比例是大不相同的，但是使用价值总得有一个自然的基质。”即是说，无论劳动实践对于人类的存在和发展、对于人类社会财富的创造和积累发生何种作用，“外部自然界的优先地位”总会保持着。

Marx’s affirmation of “the priority of external nature” historically transcended the old materialism’s similar proposition about nature. The latter affirmed nature only in the “diachronic” dimension, while the former emphasizes the achievement of “the unity of subject and object” through practice, and, on the basis of the latter’s “diachronic” dimension, fully affirms the priority of nature from the “synchronic” and “future-tense” dimensions. From the diachronic perspective, nature existed before humanity, a fact proven by modern complexity science. Lower-level systems have temporal priority; they emerge first and then, through the “convergence” of these lower levels, generate higher-level systems. The former are the components of the latter. The most significant instance of system “convergence” in the natural system is the transition from natural history to human history. In this respect, “man is a part of nature.” [5]5 Marx, *Economic and Philosophic Manuscripts of 1844*. From the synchronic perspective, nature is the foundation for the continued existence of human society. After humanity’s emergence, nature provides it with the means for continued generation, development, and enjoyment—nature is “man’s inorganic body, that is, nature insofar as it is not the human body itself, with which man must remain in continuous interaction so as not to die.” [6]6 Marx, *Grundrisse*. From the future-tense perspective, no matter to what level the form of human society evolves, the laws of nature exist eternally. Theoretically, humanity can, through practice, alter any attribute of nature except its objective reality. But from a practical standpoint, the natural attributes of humanized nature are only partially altered. That part of “nature-in-itself” latent within “humanized nature” will continue to be governed by natural laws independent of human will. Moreover, the evolution of any kind of humanized nature unfolds within the entire natural system. In this respect, “all productive forces reduce to nature.” [7]7 Marx, *Grundrisse*.

马克思对“外部自然界的优先地位”的肯定，历史性地超越了旧唯物主义关于自然界的同类命题。后者只是在“历时态”维度对自然作以肯定，前者则强调借助实践实现“主客体统一”,并在后者“历时态”的基础上，从“共时态”和“未来时态”维度全面肯定自然界的优先性。从历时态来看，自然界先于人类而存在，是现代复杂性科学所证明的。较低层级的系统在时间上具有先发性，发生后再通过各低层级的“会聚”而生成较高层级的系统。前者是后者的元件。自然界系统中最具有意义的一次系统“会聚”为自然史转向人类史。在这一方面，“人是自然界的一部分”。从共时态来看，自然界是人类社会存续的基础。人类诞生之后，自然界为其提供继续生成、发展和享受的资料——自然界是“人为了不致死亡而必须与之处于持续不断的交互作用过程的、人的身体”。从未来时态看，无论人类社会形态演进到哪一层级，自然界的规律永恒存在。从理论上讲，人类可通过实践改变除客观实在性之外的自然界存在的任何属性。但从现实性来看，人化自然的自然属性只是被部分改变。潜藏于“人化自然”中的那部分“自在自然”,将继续受到不以人的意志为转移的自然规律的支配。并且，任何一种人化自然的演变都在整个自然界系统中展开。在这方面，“一切生产力都归结为自然界”。

2. Labor as a “Mediating Activity”

2.作为“中介性活动”的劳动

“Labor” is the subjective concept in the deduction of the relations among nature, labor, and capital. Following Marx’s analytical line, after clarifying the initial relation between humanity and nature, one must, in accordance with this relation, sequentially examine the actual form of activity through which humanity enters into relation with nature—labor. Marx’s early consideration of labor was grounded in the “objectifying” activity of industrial production. In the unified relation between humanity and nature, humans are a dual existence: “subjectively, he exists as himself; objectively, he exists within these natural inorganic conditions of his own existence.” [8]8 Marx, *Grundrisse*. Objectively, humans rely on nature for survival and are passive beings; subjectively, however, humans can, through their “objectifying” activity, which distinguishes them from other animals, elevate themselves from the world-in-itself. Regarding the mode of “objectifying” activity, Marx described it thus: the web-spinning activity of a spider resembles the weaving activity of a weaver, and the skill of a bee in building its honeycomb surpasses that of many architects. Even so, the worst architect is superior to the most skillful bee, because “he has built the cell in his mind before he builds it in wax. At the end of the labor process, a result emerges that had already existed in the worker’s imagination at the beginning, that is, ideally.” [9]9 Marx, *Capital*, Vol. 1. Therefore, “objectifying” activity is a creative activity in which humans, following an “inner image,” actively transform nature to meet their own needs. Human survival, development, and the construction of human society are, in the final analysis, the result of “objectifying” activity, i.e., labor.

“劳动”是自然、劳动与资本关系演绎中的主体性概念。沿循马克思的分析思路，在厘清人与自然的初始关系后，须依据这一关系循序省察人与自然发生关系的现实活动形式——劳动。马克思早期对“劳动”的考量立足于工业生产的“对象化”活动。在人与自然的统一关系中，人是双重的存在，“从主体上说作为他自身而存在着，从客体上说又存在于自己生存的这些自然无机条件之中”。在客观上，人依靠自然界而存活，是受动性的存在物；在主观上，人又能够通过其不同于其他动物的“对象化”活动，将自身从自在世界中提升出来。对于“对象化”活动方式，马克思做了这样的描述：蜘蛛的织网活动与织工的纺织活动类似，蜜蜂巢筑的本领也已超过多数建筑师。即使如此，最蹩脚的建筑师也比最灵巧的蜜蜂高明，这是因为“他在用蜂蜡建筑蜂房以前，已经在自己的头脑中把它建成了。劳动过程结束时得到的结果，在这个过程开始时就已经在劳动者的表象中存在着，即已经观念地存在着”。是以，“对象化”活动是人依照“内心图像”能动地改造自然来满足自身需求的创设性活动，人类生存、发展，以及人类社会的建树，归根结底都是“对象化”的活动即劳动的结果。

Marx gives a clear definition of labor in *Capital*: “Labor is first of all a process between man and nature, a process by which man, through his own actions, mediates, regulates and controls the metabolism between himself and nature.” Here, labor, as a “mediating” activity, builds a bridge for the interaction between man and nature. Through labor, human beings obtain material goods from nature, and through the instruments of labor they alter the original form of the “material elements of wealth that are provided by nature,” turning them into the use-values of various products that satisfy human needs. In this sense, the labor process “is purposeful activity aimed at the production of use-values; it is an appropriation of natural substances to human requirements.” At the same time, in this labor process, man and nature complete their metabolism, realizing a two-way flow of “nature to man” and “man to nature.” On the one hand, in the production of labor, man can only alter the natural form of matter, and moreover, he must constantly “rely on the help of natural forces.” Nature thus permeates human life, displaying its existence. On the other hand, man applies concrete labor directly to nature; this is the projection of man’s essential powers onto nature. While changing nature, man also ponders how to change himself so as to utilize nature more fully and effectively. This is essentially man’s feedback to and nourishment of nature. Of course, the social form of labor also constantly changes in the course of the metabolism between man and nature, i.e., “every historically specific form of the labor process further develops its material foundations and its social forms.”

马克思在《资本论》中对劳动有明确的界定：“劳动首先是人和自然之间的过程，是人以自身的活动来中介、调整和控制人和自然之间的物质变换的过程。”在这里，劳动作为一种“中介性”活动，架起了人与自然互动的桥梁。人类通过劳动从自然界获取物质资料，通过劳动工具改变所获取到的“天然存在的物质财富要素”的原始样态，使其成为满足人的需要的各种产品的使用价值。这个意义上的劳动过程“是制造使用价值的有目的的活动，是为了人类的需要而对自然物的占有”。同时，在这个劳动过程中，人与自然完成了物质变换，实现了“自然向人”和“人向自然”的双向流动。一方面，人在劳动生产中只能改变物质的自然形式，并且，还要时常“依靠自然力的帮助”。自然界就这样渗透到人的生命中，展示其存在。另一方面，人将具体劳动直接作用于自然界，这是人的本质力量在自然界的投射。人在改变自然界之时，还在思索如何改变自身以更充分地、有效地利用自然的问题。这实质上是人对自然的反馈与供养。当然，劳动的社会形式也在人与自然的物质变换中不断改变，即“劳动过程的每个一定的历史形式，都会进一步发展这个过程的物质基础和社会形式”。

3. Capital as a “Social Force”

3.作为“社会性力量”的资本

“Capital” is the central concept in the deduction of the relations among nature, labor, and capital. Admittedly, human beings elevated themselves from the animal kingdom through labor. But if the level of human labor remained merely at the subsistence level, without opening up any distance from other animals; if social labor productivity were in such a state that the labor time of a single worker sufficed only to sustain his own life, or only to produce and reproduce the means of subsistence for his own survival, then there would be no surplus labor or surplus value, and there would be no question of modern social wealth. Clearly, the emergence of surplus labor and surplus value means that social production, under the combination of human labor and nature, has reached a new stage where it can create new value exceeding the worker’s own value, and can produce new means of subsistence beyond what the worker himself requires. In other words, human labor has achieved a certain degree of socialization. At this point, a certain amount of social wealth accumulates “as if by magic” in the form of capital.

“资本”是自然、劳动与资本关系演绎中的中心性概念。诚然，人类通过劳动从动物界中提升出来，但如果人类的劳动水平仅仅维持在生存水准层次而并未拉开与其他动物之间的距离，如果社会劳动生产率处在这样一种状况：单个劳动者的劳动时间只够维持他本人的生活，或者只够生产和再生产用于他本人生存的生活资料，那就不会出现任何剩余劳动和剩余价值，也谈不上现代社会财富。显然，剩余劳动以及剩余价值的出现意味着人类劳动与自然界结合下的社会生产，走到了能够创造出超过劳动者自身价值的新价值、能够生产出超出劳动者自身所需的生活资料的新资料的新阶段。换言之，人类劳动实现了一定程度的社会化。这时，一定的社会财富以资本的形式在客观上“神话般地”积聚起来。

“Production carried on with capital begins at this stage.” The accumulation of a certain quantity of social wealth here manifests itself as the constant accumulation and expansion of capital. In actual production, capital, with its “monetary” appeal, attracts the labor-power and means of labor it can find and brings them together. Marx argues that laborers and means of labor are always factors of production in any social formation. But in a state of separation, they are only potential factors of production. Only when they are combined in a specific way can they be transformed into actual factors of production. At this point, capital, as an independent mode of production, begins “to deal with combined labor” [7]7 Marx, *Grundrisse*.526, and begins “to process natural objects in a new (artificial) way.” In this process, capital performs the function of first grouping the labor that has already been simply assembled in a given time and space, then, using the new natural factors it has discovered, organically integrating the two to produce different forms of “collective power” in production. “Thus capital appears from the outset as a collective force, as a social force.”

“用资本来进行的生产总是在这样的发展阶段开始。”一定量的社会财富的积聚在这里表现为资本的不断积累和扩张。在现实生产中，资本以其“金钱性”的感召力，将它所能找到的劳动力与劳动资料吸引过来，并把它们聚集在一起。马克思认为，劳动者和劳动资料在任何社会形态里始终是生产要素。但分离状态下的二者只能是潜在的生产因素。只有以特定的方式将它们结合起来，才能转变为现实的生产要素。此时，资本作为一种独立的生产方式，开始“同结合的劳动打交道”[7]526,开始“采用新的方式(人工的)加工自然物”。资本在这个过程中履行着这样一种职能：它把在一定时空上已经完成了简单集合的劳动先进行分组，再利用其探索到的新的自然物因素，对二者进行有机整合，产生出不同形式的生产“集体力”。“由此可见，资本一开始就表现为集体力量，社会力量。”

As a social force, capital opens “a new epoch” in a totalizing manner: it strives to overcome the phenomenon of the deification of nature, creating humanity’s universal appropriation of nature; it strives to develop the social productive forces of labor as a whole, creating a mature and developed system of social production; it strives to break through the fetters of locality and the boundaries of nations, creating universal intercourse and comprehensive connections across the world; it strives to dissolve patriarchal relations of personal dependence, creating a social culture reflecting equality, freedom, and fraternity. Of course, capital as a social force was not fully formed and powerful from the moment of its emergence; “as long as capital is weak, it still seeks a crutch in the modes of production that preceded it, or that are disappearing with its appearance. As soon as capital feels itself strong, it throws away the crutch and moves in accordance with its own laws.”

作为一种社会力量的资本以一种总体性的方式开启了“一个新时代”：它力求克服自然神化的现象，创造了人类对自然界的普遍占有；它力求发展全社会的劳动生产力，创造了成熟且发达的社会生产体系；它力求突破地域的束缚和民族的边界，创造了世界的普遍交往与全面联系；它力求解除宗法的人身依附关系，创造了反映平等、自由、博爱的社会文化。当然，资本作为一种社会力量并非一经问世就极为饱满和强大，“只要资本的力量还薄弱，它本身就还要在以往的或随着资本的出现而正在消逝的生产方式中寻求拐杖。而一旦资本感到自己强大起来，它就抛开这种拐杖，按它自己的规律运动”。

II. Capital Accumulation, Labor Alienation, Nature’s Impoverishment: From Unity to Opposition

二、资本积累、劳动异化、自然贫困：从统一到对立

The movement from unity to opposition is the core theme of the deduction of the relations among nature, labor, and capital in *Capital* and its manuscripts. In the cycle of negative feedback among the three, capital becomes an other completely opposed to labor and nature; technology, backed by capital, carries out the total incorporation and domination of labor and nature. “For capital, the only usefulness that any object can possess in itself is that it enables capital to be preserved and increased.” Driven by the law of valorization, the capitalist, “as personified capital,” relentlessly pursues the goal of valorization. The realization of this goal requires a steady, preferably inexhaustible and free supply of raw materials. This undoubtedly increases the demand on labor and nature. Within the limited physiological endurance of the worker, the intensification of capitalist production ultimately creates the miserable plight of all workers; within the limited space of the earth, the expansion of the scale of capitalist production ultimately creates widespread fragments of nature. As the logic of capital penetrates every corner of the world, every sphere of the world displays the greed of capital accumulation, and the capitalist world, the workers, and nature thus fall into a protracted conflict.

从统一走向对立是《资本论》及其手稿对自然、劳动与资本关系演绎分析的核心主题。在三者负反馈关系循环圈中，资本成为与劳动、自然完全对立的他者，技术在资本的加持下进行了对劳动与自然的全部收编和统治。“对资本来说，任何一个对象本身所能具有的唯一的有用性，只能是使资本保存和增大。”资本被价值增殖规律推动，资本家“作为人格化的资本”无休止地追逐着增殖目标。而增殖目标的实现需要最好是源源不断的、无偿供应的原材料。这无疑增加了对劳动和自然的需求。在劳动者有限的生理承受范围内，资本主义生产强度的增加最终造就了所有劳动者的悲惨境遇；在有限的地球空间中，资本主义生产规模的扩大最终造就了广泛的自然碎片。随着资本逻辑在全世界的渗透，世界的每一个领域都展现了资本积累的贪欲，资本主义世界和劳动者以及自然界由此陷入了持久的冲突之中。

1. The Inflation of Capital’s Drive for Valorization

1.资本增殖欲望的膨胀

Nietzsche said that the will to power is the instinct of life: “Every living thing strives to spread as far as possible within the limits of its own strength, and to conquer everything weaker; thus it discovers the joy of its own existence.” This will to power is fully manifested in the instinct of capital. Marx points out: “Capital has only one life-instinct: to valorize itself, to create surplus value.” Embedded in the inner core of the logic of capital is the principle of utility, and built into it is the law of valorization. The so-called principle of utility means that capital regards all beings as useful things, and all beings are its instruments of use. “Useful” here does not simply mean beneficial to the capitalist’s private production and personal life in a narrow sense, but rather convenient for the capitalist to obtain greater exchange-value. For in the independent world of capital, use-value, as well as other values originally excluded from capitalist production, gradually cease to exist. The use-value of beings overflows the capitalist’s field of vision, degenerating into a mere tool or means. In essence, what the capitalist pursues is not “real” use-value but “illusory” exchange-value. To achieve the principle of utility, capital forces nature and labor to combine in every possible way to produce commodities from which exchange-value can be captured.

尼采讲到，权力意志是生命的本能，“每个有生命的有机体都在自己力量允许的范围内尽可能远地蔓延开去，并且征服一切弱小者。这样，它就发现了它自身存在的乐趣”。这种权力意志在资本的本能上体现得淋漓尽致。马克思指出：“资本只有一种生活本能，这就是增殖自身，创造剩余价值。”在资本逻辑的内核里，内嵌着的是效用原则，内置着的是增殖法则。所谓效用原则，即资本将一切存在物都视为有用物，一切存在物都是其使用工具。此处的“有用”,并非简单意义上的利于资本家私人生产与个人生活的增益，而是便于资本家获得更大交换价值。因为，在资本的独立世界里，使用价值以及本来就被排除在资本主义生产之外的其他价值等，都在逐渐不复存在。存在物的使用价值溢出于资本家视野，沦为纯粹的工具手段。质言之，资本家追求的并非“实在”的使用价值而是“虚幻”的交换价值。为了达臻效用原则，资本以尽可能的方式迫使自然与劳动结合而生产出可猎获交换价值的商品。

If the principle of utility is the foundational link in the unfolding of capital’s logic, then the law of valorization is the extended step in the operation of capital’s logic. “The movement of capital is limitless.” Capital moves in valorization, and valorizes in movement. This means that the process of capital’s pursuit of incremental expansion has no endpoint; if capital is to secure its place in the economic and social life of capitalist society, it must replicate the “production of capital” and “reproduction of capital” in a copy-like manner. This copy-like procedure requires extending capital’s tentacles to more elements of natural resources and labor elements. On this basis, the production dominated by capital’s logic plunders nature and labor, and as the limitless pursuit of capital profit proceeds, it will be carried out on an ever-larger scale, increasingly turning laborers and nature into objective, one-dimensional beings. At this point, the capitalist, merely as “personified capital,” will by no means kindly take into account nature’s prior laws and existing boundaries, or the internal and external physiological and psychological limits of laborers. For the “sword of Damocles” hanging over his head—whether capital can preserve its value and whether it can valorize—absolutely does not permit him to do so.

如果说效用原则是资本逻辑展开的基础环节，那么增殖法则是资本逻辑运转的延展步骤。“资本的运动是没有限度的。”资本在增殖中运动，在运动中增殖。这意味着资本追求增量的扩张过程没有终点，资本要想安身立命于资本主义经济社会生活，必须复制似地进行“资本的生产”与“再生产”。这种复制似的流程，需要将资本的触角伸展到更多的自然资源要素和劳动要素之上。以此论及，由资本逻辑主导的生产对自然和劳动的掠夺，将伴随着没有限度的资本利润追求，愈来愈大规模地进行，越来越把劳动者和自然变成对象性的、单向度的存在物。这时候，只是作为“人格化的资本”的资本家，绝不会善良地顾及自然先在的规律与存在的边界、劳动者的内外生理与心理限制。因为高悬在其头顶的资本能否保值、能否增殖的“达摩克利斯之剑”决不允许其这样做。

2. The Intensification of the Degree of Labor Exploitation

2.劳动剥削程度的加重

To discuss capital’s exploitation of labor, one must first return to the specific scene of “equal exchange” in bourgeois society. Marx says that the laborer, in order to obtain money with which to purchase a certain quantity of means of subsistence sufficient for his own survival, sells his own labor on the market according to the principle of exchange of equivalents, thereby completing an “equal exchange” with the capitalist. This process of entering into a relation has entirely different meanings for the two parties. “The worker cannot become richer through this exchange.” The worker sells the right to use his labor to the capitalist only because of the pressure of survival (to avoid starvation and being buried). Once the capitalist obtains the right to use the laborer’s labor, he immediately brings living labor before capital, for capital “has life only by sucking in living labor.” Thus, for the capitalist, by appropriating another’s labor, the value of capital is valorized. For the worker, his originally subjective activity becomes the capitalist’s thing. Although his living labor has not been stripped from his body, it cannot be realized independently; it can only be “present” in the capitalist’s factory. “The worker lives only to increase capital, and is allowed to live only insofar as the interests of the ruling class require it.” At precisely this moment, the worker’s labor directly mutates from productive to alien. This alienness manifests itself in the worker, in a specific production process, producing with his labor a scene of relations of domination that oppresses and exploits him and benefits the survival and valorization of capital. It can be said that this relation is the beginning of the alienation of labor.

要讨论资本对于劳动的剥削，首先要回到存在于资产阶级社会的特殊的“平等交易”现场。马克思说，劳动者为了换回可购买供自己生存下去的一定量的生活资料的货币，按照等价交换的原则在市场上出卖自身劳动，由此完成了与资本家的“平等交易”。这一发生关系的过程对二者来说，意义完全不同。“工人通过这种交换不可能致富。”工人只是因生存压力(避免被饿死、被埋葬)出卖自身劳动的使用权于资本家。资本家在得到劳动者劳动的使用权后，立即将活劳动带到资本面前，因为资本“只有吮吸活劳动才有生命”。于是，对资本家来说，通过占有他人劳动而使资本价值增殖。对工人来说，原本属于他的主体性活动变成了资本家的东西。虽然他的活劳动没有从他的身体中被剥离出来，但它也无法独立地实现，只有在资本家的工厂里才能“在场”。“工人仅仅为增殖资本而活着，只有在统治阶级的利益需要他活着的时候才能活着。”工人的劳动恰恰在这时直接从生产性畸变为异己性。这种异己性表现为工人在特定的生产中，以其劳动生产出了一个压迫和盘剥自己的、利于资本生存和增殖的统治关系场景。可以说，这个关系是劳动异化的开端。

Now, let us return to the scene of capitalist production where capital exploits the worker’s labor. First, external exploitation. “Capital has always dreamed of achieving autonomy, thereby ridding itself of labor once and for all.” Especially in the early stages of capitalist development, in order to obtain more valorized value of capital, capitalists adopted crude and coercive means to encroach upon the surplus of the laborers’ quantity of labor. They restricted workers’ rest time and adopted shift systems to force laborers to provide as much labor time as possible. At this time, “capital develops into a coercive relation, which compels the working class to perform more labor than the narrow scope of its own needs for life would dictate.” The capitalist’s means are by no means singular. “When the law makes it forever impossible for capital to lengthen the working day, capital then seeks to compensate by constantly raising the intensity of labor.” To obtain more profit, capitalists applied machine production. On the one hand, the system of machinery raised labor productivity, shortening the worker’s necessary labor time and increasing, in a more concealed manner, the time the worker labors unpaid for the capitalist; on the other hand, it immorally expanded the “quantity” of the labor force. Because machinery can “use workers with no muscular strength or with immature physical development but more flexible limbs,” it absorbed female labor, underage labor, and even child labor into the ranks of the employed, thereby opening up the most extensive and most potential labor force, further weakening the competitive ability and bargaining power of individual laborers in the exchange market. Second, self-loss. “Labor is the worker’s own life-activity, the worker’s own expression of life.” Yet after labor turns into wage-labor, the worker’s “life-activity” is degraded into a means of “maintaining the needs of physical existence,” and the worker’s “consciousness,” which distinguishes him from animals, is distorted into a “livelihood practice.” When the worker engages in productive labor, labor is external to the worker, a self-sacrifice and self-torment. When productive labor temporarily ends, the worker has not earned the output product from his toil, nor has he obtained the release of his nature or spiritual satisfaction; he has merely obtained “the minimum wage appropriate to his beast-like state of existence.” When the existence of labor unfortunately splits into the existence of capital, the worker’s conditions of survival are infinitely encroached upon and squeezed by the capitalist, and there is no outlet for the development of his individual free and conscious labor; he gradually becomes opposed to his own life-activity.

现在，我们再回到资本剥削工人劳动的资本主义生产现场。第一，外界剥削。“资本一直梦想取得自主性，从而一劳永逸地让自己摆脱劳动。”尤其是在资本主义发展初期，资本家为了获得更多的资本增殖价值，采取粗陋强制的手段侵占劳动者劳动量的剩余。他们限制工人休息时间、采用轮班制度逼迫劳动者提供尽可能多的劳动时间。这时的“资本发展成为一种强制关系，迫使工人阶级超出自身生活需要的狭隘范围而从事更多的劳动”。资本家的手段绝非只有一种。“当法律使资本永远不能延长工作日时，资本就力图不断提高劳动强度来补偿。”为了获得更多利润，资本家应用机器生产。机器体系一方面提升了劳动生产率，使得工人必要劳动时间缩短，以更为隐蔽的方式增加了工人无偿为资本家劳动的时间；另一方面极不道德地扩充了劳动力“量”的队伍。机器由于可以“使用没有肌肉力或身体发育不成熟而四肢比较灵活的工人”,因而将妇女劳动力、未成年劳动力更甚儿童劳动力吸收至雇佣队伍中来，从而开辟了最大化范围和最具有潜力的劳动力，进一步弱化了交易市场上的个体劳动者的竞争能力和议价能力。第二，自我丧失。“劳动是工人本身的生命活动，是工人本身的生命的表现。”而劳动在走向雇佣劳动后，工人的“生命活动”被降格为“维持肉体生存需要”的手段，工人区别于动物的“有意识”之处被扭曲为“生计实践”。工人在从事生产劳动之时，劳动对工人来说是外在的、自我牺牲和自我折磨的。在生产劳动暂时结束之时，工人在辛劳中没有挣得产出产品，没有获得本性释放和精神满足，而仅仅得到了和自身“牲畜般的存在状态相适应的最低工资”。在劳动的存在“不幸地”裂变为资本的存在之时，工人的生存条件被资本家无限侵占挤压，个人自由自觉劳动方面的发展毫无出路，他们逐渐与其生命活动进行逆反。

3. The Accumulation of the State of Natural Poverty

3.自然贫困状态的累积

The alienation of labor leads to the alienation of nature. This point must be discussed starting from capital’s establishment of absolute power over labor by controlling the objective conditions of labor’s production, or its basis for survival—nature. In Marx’s words, this is “the monopoly of landed property is even the basis of the monopoly of capital.” Through violent enclosure movements, capital drove peasants off the land; the peasants lost their “inalienable conditions of existence and reproduction,” became laborers who possessed none of the original sources of the means of production, and became workers who had to sell their own free labor to capital to obtain the money wages used to purchase means of subsistence. This means that capital severed the original relation between man and nature, and thereby the form of wage-labor most conducive to capital’s valorization was established. Wage-labor, as the worker’s alienated form of labor, transforms nature, penetrating every corner where profit can be made, such as “the Black Mountain forest,” “the inexhaustible coal seams beneath the English earth,” “the River Irk in Manchester,” and so on. The result of this overexploitation, which disregards nature’s carrying capacity, is that laborers become increasingly detached from their direct connection with nature, and an “increasingly decaying nature” becomes the element of the laborers’ life.

劳动异化引致自然异化。关于这点，要从资本以掌控劳动产生的客观条件或其生存基础——自然来建立对劳动的绝对权力说起。用马克思的话来说，即为“地产的垄断甚至是资本垄断的基础”。通过暴力的圈地运动，资本将农民从土地上驱逐，农民丢失了其“不能出让的生存条件和再生产条件”,沦为不占有一切生产资料的初始性源泉的劳动者，沦为不得不通过出卖自身自由劳动力从资本那里取得用以购买生存资料的货币工资的工人。这意味着资本对人与自然之间原始关系的斩断，进而最有利于资本增殖的雇佣劳动形式被建立起来了。雇佣劳动作为工人的异化了的劳动形态对自然的改造，渗透在每一个有利可图的角落，如“布莱克山森林”“英国地下的无穷尽的煤矿层”“曼彻斯特的艾尔克河”等等。这种不顾自然承载力而过度开发的结果是劳动者愈来愈脱离与自然的直接联系，一个“日益腐败的自然界”成了劳动者的生活要素。

The reason capital can exploit nature without limit is that nature “costs capital nothing.” First, capital does not need to pay money for natural resources whose property rights cannot be clearly defined. Marx points out: “The productive forces resulting from cooperation and the division of labor cost capital nothing. They are natural forces of social labor. The natural forces used in the production process, such as steam, water, etc., also cost nothing.” As for the excreta produced in this process, including waste gas, waste water, waste residue, etc., the pollution they cause to nature is even more cost-free. Once these cost-free natural resources are targeted by capital’s goal of valorization, they fall into a state of being abused. Second, for natural resources with private property rights, such as land, minerals, etc., capital does pay a certain amount of ground-rent and rent. But this is only a temporary advance; these ground-rents and rents are ultimately shifted onto consumers (the users of the commodities). In essence, these ground-rents (whether differential rent or absolute rent) and rents ultimately originate from the surplus value created in the sphere of production, which is obtained by agricultural capitalists through monopolizing land management rights and exceeds the average profit. The profit incentive—whoever possesses these resources can share in more surplus profit—leads various capitalist organizations to acquire ownership of this type of natural resource through various non-labor channels. Thus, this resource is repeatedly appropriated. Finally, just like the impoverishment of the worker, nature also moves toward “impoverishment.” This process of impoverishment, under the penetration of capital’s powerful will to expand and valorize, accumulates rapidly.

资本之所以能够无限制地榨取自然界，是因为自然界“不费资本分文”。首先，资本无需为产权无法明晰的自然资源支付金钱。马克思指出：“由协作和分工产生的生产力，不费资本分文。它是社会劳动的自然力。用于生产过程的自然力，如蒸汽、水等等，也不费分文。”至于在这个过程中产生的排泄物，包括废气、废水、废渣等对自然造成的污染更是无代价的。这些无偿的自然资源，一旦被资本增殖目标所瞄准，便会陷于被滥用的境地。其次，对于具有私人产权的自然资源，如土地、矿产等，资本确实支付了一定的地租和租金。但这只是暂时的垫付，这些地租和租金最后会转嫁到消费者(商品的使用者)身上。质言之，这些地租(无论是级差地租还是绝对地租)和租金最终来源于由农业资本家靠垄断土地经营权所获得的、超过平均利润以上的那部分生产领域所创造的剩余价值。谁占有这些资源，谁就能够分割到更多的超额利润的利益驱动导致各资本家组织通过各种非劳动途径来获取此类自然资源的所有权。于是，该种资源被反复占有。最后同工人的贫困化一样，自然界也走向“贫困化”。这个贫困化的过程，在强大的资本扩张增殖意志的贯穿下，迅速累积。

In the process where the swelling of capital’s drive for valorization intensifies the degree of labor exploitation and the accumulation of nature’s impoverished state, what cannot be overlooked is technology as the legitimate foundation supporting capital’s valorization. To put it further, capital’s subsumption of labor and nature is realized under the condition of “technology.” For capital cannot achieve self-valorization single-handedly; it must incorporate other elements through the market mechanism of capitalist society. The technology engendered by “the social relations represented by capital” naturally forms an alliance with capital at this point, serving as full “wings” that assist capital’s valorization. In reality, for capital’s drive for valorization, all forces and elements are equivalent things. To fulfill capital’s supreme mission and realize its ultimate purpose, the intellectual form of technology (relevant scientific knowledge) and the material carriers of technology (machinery and the system of machinery) have all become forces and powers opposed to labor and nature, used to exploit, dominate and control labor and nature. On the one hand, technology extends the functions of the laborer’s labor and of nature, thereby increasing the exploitable material for capital; on the other hand, the formation of the technological system (the system of machinery) completes the substitution for the labor subject and the laborer’s labor skills, thereby deepening the degree of capital’s manipulation of the laborer. Most importantly, in the process by which capital achieves complete domination over labor and nature through technology, capital gradually penetrates all spheres of social production and all aspects of social life, thereby establishing its absolute authority over the existence of all humanity.

在资本增殖欲望的膨胀导致劳动剥削程度的加重以及自然贫困状态的累积过程中，不可忽视的是技术这一支持资本增殖的合法性基础。进一步言之，资本对劳动与自然的统摄是在“技术”条件下实现的。因为，资本无法单枪匹马实现自我增殖，它必须通过资本主义社会市场机制将其他要素纳入进来。“由资本所代表的社会关系”所催生的技术，在此时，与资本天然地形成了一种同盟关系，充当起辅助资本增殖的饱满“羽翼”。实则，对资本增殖欲望而言，一切力量和要素都是等同的东西。为了完成资本的最高使命和实现资本的最终目的，技术的知识化形态(相关科学知识)以及技术的物质化载体(机器设备和机器体系)都成了与劳动和自然相对立的，用来剥削、驾驭和操控劳动及自然的力量和权力。一方面，技术使得劳动者的劳动和自然界的功能延伸，从而增加了资本的可剥削材料；另一方面，技术体系(机器体系)的形成完成了对劳动主体和劳动者劳动技能的替代，从而加深了资本对劳动者的摆布程度。最主要的是，在资本通过技术实现对劳动和自然的完全统治的过程中，资本逐渐渗透至社会生产一切领域和社会生活的一切方面，从而确立起其对全人类生存的绝对权威。

III. Capital’s Destruction, Labor’s Emancipation, Nature’s Resurrection: From Servitude to Transcendence

三、资本毁灭、劳动解放、自然复活：从奴役到超越

Moving from servitude to transcendence is the future dimension of the deductive analysis of the relations among nature, labor and capital in *Capital* and Its Manuscripts. Within the cyclical circuit of the overall feedback relations among the three, and in the historical process of the contradictory movement between man and nature and the game of interests between labor and capital, both dominated by capital, there is inherently contained a dual revolution of self-negation in conception and in practice. Capital’s rule “on the one hand calls to life the powers of industry and science such as no previous epoch of human history had ever suspected; on the other hand it reveals symptoms of decay.” [14]14 Karl Marx and Frederick Engels, *The Communist Manifesto*, in *Marx & Engels Collected Works*, vol. 6 (London: Lawrence & Wishart, 1976), p. 489. [The quotation in the original Chinese text is from the Chinese translation of the *Manifesto*; the English here follows the standard English edition.] When capital, “like a sorcerer who is no longer able to control the powers of the underworld whom he has called up by his spells,” [15]15 Ibid., p. 490. the only result brought about by the contradictions it cannot overcome is that capital will self-destruct in the process of development according to laws as hard as iron. Capital’s unrestrained plundering of natural resources and its unceasing accumulation not only accelerate the production of factors leading to the disintegration of the capitalist system but also accelerate the emergence of the tendency for the rate of profit to fall as the organic composition of capital rises. At this point, within this space of contradiction, the unity and struggle of the laboring class develop, and it becomes a historical necessity to thoroughly escape the inhuman conditions in the state of labor, to seek complete labor emancipation, to reclaim the re-occupation of natural resources, and to usher in the resurrection of nature.

从奴役走向超越是《资本论》及其手稿对自然、劳动与资本关系演绎分析的未来向度。在三者整体性反馈关系循环圈中，在由资本主导的人与自然矛盾运动和劳动与资本利益博弈的历史进程中，内在蕴含着一场观念上和实践上自我否定的双重革命。资本的统治“一方面产生了以往人类历史上任何一个时代都不能想象的工业和科学的力量；而另一方面却显露出衰颓的征兆”。当资本“像一个魔法师一样不能再支配自己用法术呼唤出来的魔鬼”时，其自身无法克服的矛盾最终带来的结果只有一个，即资本将在如铁一般的规律的发展过程中自我崩溃。资本无节制地剥夺自然资源和无休止地积累不仅加速生产着导致资本主义制度瓦解的因素，也加速产生着因资本有机构成提高而利润率下降的趋势。此时，在这个矛盾的空间中，劳动阶级的团结和抗争发展起来，彻底摆脱劳动状态中的非人境遇、寻求到完全的劳动解放、夺回对自然资源的重新占有、迎来自然界的复活成为历史的必然。

1. Capital’s Destruction: Completed within Limits and Negation

1.资本毁灭：在限制与否定中完成

The sharp disparity in the positive and negative feedback relations among nature, labor and capital gives rise to a critical tension regarding capital. Within this tension, capital’s self-negation and institutional limits are confirmed. Although capital pervades the entire capitalist society, this does not mean it can exist and develop arbitrarily. In the capitalist production process, “capital and its self-valorization appear as the starting point and the end point, as the motive and purpose of production; production is only production for capital, and not the reverse, where the means of production are merely the ever-expanding means for the life process of the society of producers.” [16]16 Karl Marx, *Capital*, vol. 3, in *Marx & Engels Collected Works*, vol. 37 (London: Lawrence & Wishart, 1998), p. 879. [The Chinese text cites from the Chinese translation; the English follows the standard English edition.] The operation of capital unfolds within the aforementioned bounds. And “the means — the unconditional development of the social productive forces — comes into constant conflict with the limited end, the valorization of existing capital,” [17]17 Ibid., p. 259. and the combination of the two indicates that capital’s limit lies in “capital itself,” or rather, capital will end with itself. Regarding the internal process of capital’s negative movement, “every link and stage of capital’s movement, in its transition to the next link and stage, is a process of dialectical negation.” [18]18 This is a paraphrase of a point commonly made in Chinese Marxist scholarship on the dialectical movement of capital; no direct source is given in the original. From commodity — money — capital, money capital — productive capital — commodity capital, commercial capital — industrial capital — financial capital; from commodity value — market value — price of production; from the production of surplus value — the realization of surplus value — the division of surplus value; from civil society — the nation-state — the world market, Marx’s critique of political economy based on historical materialism thus scientifically reveals that the successive transformations of capital’s forms and the successive changes of capital’s fields are also the negative movement of capital. In this process, capital “generates” and “grows” itself. Regarding the external limits of nature and labor that coexist with capital, the total quantity of natural resources and the capacity for metabolism are limited; the satisfaction of capital’s drive for valorization is positively correlated with the overall carrying pressure on nature. Under this scenario, the contradiction between capital and nature is bound to erupt. The history and facts of “nature’s revenge” have also proven that the continuous valorization of capital can only be realized within certain natural limits. The laborers in the capitalist production process are not things, not perpetual motion machines; the upper limit of their physical endurance is another limit that capitalist production cannot break free from. The above limits will not dissipate with capital’s upward development; on the contrary, they become increasingly severe.

自然、劳动与资本的正负向反馈关系的强烈落差导引出了对于资本的批判性张力。在这一张力中，资本的自我否定与制度限制得以确证。尽管资本充斥整个资本主义社会，但并不代表其可以随心所欲的存在和发展。资本主义生产过程中的“资本及其自行增殖，表现为生产的起点和终点，表现为生产的动机和目的；生产只是为资本而生产，而不是反过来生产资料只是生产者社会的生活过程不断扩大的手段”。资本的运作在上述的限域中展开。而“手段——社会生产力的无条件的发展——不断地和现有资本的增殖这个有限的目的发生冲突”,二者相加说明资本的限制在于“资本自身”,或者说，资本将终结于自身。就资本的否定性内在运动过程来讲，“资本运动的每一环节、阶段向下一环节、阶段的过渡，都是辩证否定的过程”。从商品—货币—资本，货币资本—生产资本—商品资本，商业资本—工业资本—金融资本；从商品价值—市场价值—生产价格；从剩余价值的生产—剩余价值的实现—剩余价值的分割；从市民社会—民族国家—世界市场，马克思基于唯物史观的政治经济学批判就这样科学地揭示出，资本形态的次次转化与资本场域的次次变换也是资本的否定运动。在这个过程中，资本使自己“生成”并“成长”。就与资本持存相关的自然和劳动的外部限制来讲，自然资源总量与代谢能力是有限的，资本增殖欲望的满足与自然的总体承载压力成正相关，这一情景下，资本与自然的矛盾必将爆发。“自然报复”的历史和事实亦已证明，资本持续增殖只有在一定的自然界限内才能实现。资本主义生产过程中的劳动者并非物，并非永动机器，其身体承受力的最高界限是资本生产不可挣脱的又一限制。上述限制不会随着资本的向上发展而就此消解，反而愈发严峻。

Capital’s ultimate negation is prominently embodied in capital’s destruction. Because the logic of capital’s valorization unfolds continuously, it necessarily opposes itself, thereby creating conditions for a higher stage of wealth production, means of production, and relations of production. This, to some extent, constructs the internal foundation of a future society. The smooth unfolding of capital’s logic means the realization of capital’s own value and its social utility. The former indicates that capital has completed its stipulated task and achieved its preset purpose; the latter indicates that capital historically contributes to social development. From the perspective of the latter, the operation of capital brings about a leap in productive forces and an innovation in relations of production. This also heralds the beginning of capital’s destruction. This is determined by the dialectical movement of the relations between productive forces and relations of production. “It is the periodic cycle of the various movements undergone by modern industry, culminating in the general crisis, that most acutely brings home to the actual capitalist the contradictory movement of capitalist society.” [19]19 Karl Marx, *Capital*, vol. 3, in *Marx & Engels Collected Works*, vol. 37, p. 259. [The Chinese text cites from the Chinese translation; the English follows the standard English edition.] The basic contradiction between productive forces and relations of production in capitalist society is always irrepressible; periodically erupting economic crises, financial crises, and crises of the real economy always bring about the destruction of productive forces and the deterioration of labor-capital relations. When the productive forces of capitalist society develop to a certain point, they will ultimately break through the relations of production dominated by capital; only thus can a higher level of development of productive forces be realized. The proletariat is the subjective force that destroys capital.

资本最终的否定显著地体现在资本毁灭上。由于资本增殖逻辑的持续展开，其必然地进行自我反对，以为更高阶段的财富生产、生产资料和生产关系的出现创造条件。这在某种程度上构造了未来社会的内在基础。资本逻辑的顺利展开意味着资本自身价值和社会效用的实现。前者表明资本完成了其规定性任务并达到了预设性目的，后者表明资本为社会发展历史地贡献着力量。从后者意义来看，资本的运作带来了生产力的跃升和生产关系的革新。这也预示着资本毁灭的开始。这点是由生产力和生产关系的辩证运动关系决定的。“使实际的资产者最深切地感到资本主义社会充满矛盾的运动的，是现代工业所经历的周期循环的各个变动，而这种变动的顶点就是普遍危机。”资本主义社会的生产力和生产关系的基本矛盾始终不可遏制，周期性爆发的经济危机、金融危机、实体经济危机总是带来生产力的破坏和劳资关系的恶化。资本主义社会生产力发展到一定的程度终会冲破由资本为主导的生产关系，只有如此，才会实现生产力的更高阶发展。无产阶级便是毁灭资本的主体性力量。

2. Labor’s Emancipation: Realized through Unity and Revolution

2.劳动解放：在联合与革命中实现

The rule of capital brings about the growth and unity of the army of workers. Because “the interests of capital and the interests of wage labor are diametrically opposed,” the proletariat uniting to wage a proletarian revolution against the bourgeoisie is a direct consequence of capitalist exploitation. The real proletariat, as a product of capital accumulation, develops in step with capital accumulation but not in the same direction. As “the social wealth, i.e., the functioning capital, grows larger,” the greater the absolute size of the proletariat and its labor productivity, the greater its poverty and the torment of labor it endures. More and more wage workers gradually become aware of the commonality of their interests and the necessity of unity. They coalesce to form organizations such as trade unions and labor federations, and through these organizations they engage in rights-defense negotiations and collective resistance actions against the bourgeoisie. As Marx vividly pointed out: “In order to ‘resist’ the serpent that torments them, the workers must put their heads together and, as a class, forcibly win a national law, a powerful social barrier, that prevents them from selling themselves and their offspring into death and slavery through a voluntary contract with capital.” In 1867, Marx placed his clear hope for revolution on the development of the working class. He noted that wherever capitalist development spreads, “whether it will take a more brutal or a more humane form depends on the degree of development of the working class itself. Hence the present ruling class, apart from its nobler motives, is compelled by its own immediate interests to remove all legally controllable obstacles to the development of the working class.” The workers’ struggle is not limited to fighting the capitalists; they must also unite to demand that the government perfect the legal system protecting the interests of the working class. In short, “the downfall of the bourgeoisie and the victory of the proletariat” is inevitably first manifested in the growth and development of the proletariat and the inevitability of its阶段性 victories in the struggle against the interests of capital.

资本的统治带来了劳动者队伍的壮大和团结。由于“资本的利益和雇佣劳动的利益是截然对立的”,因此，无产阶级联合起来进行反抗资产阶级的无产阶级革命是资本主义剥削的直接后果。现实的无产阶级作为资本积累的产物，与资本积累同步但非同向发展。随着“社会的财富即执行职能的资本越大”,无产阶级的绝对总量和劳动生产力越大，他们的贫困和遭受的劳动折磨却越多。愈来愈多的雇佣工人逐渐意识到其利益的相通性与联合的必要性。他们凝聚在一起成立了工会、工联等组织，并通过这些组织与资产阶级进行维权交涉和集体反抗行动。正如马克思形象指出：“为了‘抵御’折磨他们的毒蛇，工人必须把他们的头聚在一起，作为一个阶级来强行争得一项国家法律，一个强有力的社会屏障，使自己不致再通过自愿与资本缔结的契约而把自己和后代卖出去送死和受奴役。”1867年，马克思把革命的明确希望寄托于工人阶级的发展。他指出，在资本主义的发展所波及的地方“将采取较残酷的还是较人道的形式，那要看工人阶级自身的发展程度而定。所以，现在的统治阶级，撇开其较高尚的动机不说，他们的切身利益也迫使他们除掉一切可以由法律控制的、妨害工人阶级发展的障碍”。工人斗争不仅限于同资本家的斗争，还要团结起来，要求政府完善保护工人阶级利益的法律制度。总之，“资产阶级的灭亡和无产阶级的胜利”不可避免地首先体现在无产阶级的发展壮大和他们同资本利益斗争中的阶段性胜利的必然性中。

The goal of labor emancipation is to achieve free labor. Marx did not explicitly define free labor, but based on his critique of wage labor and his conception of a future society, free labor is the form of labor organization in a communist society, where workers, on the basis of common ownership of the means of production, voluntarily unite in cooperation and autonomously organize and manage all production activities. In nature, free labor is completely distinct from wage labor, which serves merely as a means of human subsistence; it is a creative practical activity that fully manifests the essential powers of the human being. In terms of the subject, all members of society are workers; classes that do not work or that profit by exploiting the labor of others no longer exist. In terms of characteristics, free labor is conscious, dignified, pleasurable, and happy. In terms of outcomes, the fruits of labor under free labor are distributed according to need across the whole of society, and the sense of fulfillment from labor is strong. Only by engaging in free labor can “the natural existence of the human being become his human existence, and nature become human for him.”

劳动解放的目标是达致自由劳动。关于自由劳动，马克思没有明确说明，但根据其对雇佣劳动的批判以及对未来社会的构想，自由劳动是共产主义社会中的劳动组织形式，劳动者在生产资料共有的基础上，自愿联合协作、自行组织管理全部生产活动。在性质上，自由劳动完全区别于仅仅作为人的生存手段的雇佣劳动，是完全彰显人的本质力量的创造性实践活动；在主体上，全社会成员都是劳动者，不劳动或靠剥削其他人的劳动而获利的阶级不再存在。从特点来看，自由劳动是自觉的、体面的、愉悦的、幸福的；从结果来看，自由劳动下的劳动成果在全社会范围内按需分配，劳动获得感强。只有进行自由劳动，“人的自然的存在对他来说才是人的合乎人性的存在，并且自然界对他来说才成为人”。

3. The Resurrection of Nature: Achieved through Sublation and Reconstruction

3.自然复活：在扬弃与重建中达到

The resurrection of nature means freeing nature from the predicament of destruction and plunder caused by capital accumulation, that is, eliminating the alienation of nature. For the human being as subject, the resurrection of nature means that the laws of nature are recognized and respected, and that the natural environment and natural resources are rationally protected and scientifically utilized. Capitalism cannot achieve this. Only communism is “the genuine resolution of the conflict between human being and nature and between human being and human being.” One of the main characteristics of communism is the positive sublation of private property. At this point, the key link in nature’s resurrection emerges: the sublation of capitalist private property and entry into the association of free individuals. The resurrection of nature within the association of free individuals is the realization of the dual affirmation of nature as natural nature and nature as human nature, i.e., the realization of the determination that “the human being is not merely a natural being, but a human natural being.” According to Marx, from the perspective of the subject, the resurrection of nature means that the human being’s feeling for nature, the human feeling for nature, and hence the human natural feeling, are created by the human being’s own labor. This first of all signifies the disappearance of the state where “the human being’s relation to nature is exactly like the animal’s relation to nature; human beings are as subservient to nature as cattle,” and simultaneously signifies the disappearance of the state where, due to the domination of capital, “the completely unnatural desolation, the increasingly decaying nature, becomes the element of his life” in human existence.

自然复活是使自然从资本累积导致的被破坏、被掠夺的困境中解脱出来，也就是消除自然异化。自然复活对于作为主体的人来说是自然规律的被认识和被尊重，是自然环境和自然资源的合理保护和科学利用。资本主义无法做到这一点。只有共产主义“是人和自然界之间、人和人之间的矛盾的真正解决”。共产主义的主要特征之一是对私有财产的积极扬弃。此处，自然界走向复活的关键一环凸现出来——扬弃资本主义私有制，进入自由人的联合体。自然在自由人的联合体中的复活，是自然的自然界和属人的自然界双重肯定的实现，即“人不仅仅是自然存在物，而且是人的自然存在物”的规定成为现实。按照马克思的观点，自然复活从主体角度看，是使人对自然的感觉、自然界的人的感觉，因而也是人的自然感觉被人本身的劳动创造出来。这首先意味着“人们同自然界的关系完全像动物同自然界的关系一样，人们就像牲畜一样慑服于自然界”的状态的消失，同时意味着在由于资本的宰制导致的人的生活中“完全违反自然的荒芜，日益腐败的自然界，成了他的生活要素”的状况的消失。

The condition for the resurrection of nature is liberation from the rule of capital under private property. “Private property, as the opposite of social, collective property, exists only where the means of labor and the external conditions of labor belong to private individuals.” After the dissolution of primitive society, human society first experienced the simplest form of private property: small-scale private property, where the laborer, based on his own labor, possessed the means of production on a small scale. Under small-scale private property, the three elements of the labor process were integrated, the labor process was dispersed and simple, and the individual interacted with nature through labor, sketching a pastoral, nature-friendly picture of production. From the natural economy to the small commodity economy, from the polarization of small commodity producers to the establishment of the capitalist commodity economy, when a society based on capital develops to a certain point, small-scale private property “produces the material means for its own destruction.” In essence, with the progress of capital accumulation and the intense polarization in competition, the property of the majority of small producers is merged into the large property of a minority of capitalists, and dispersed small-scale private property is transformed into concentrated large-scale private property. Marx called this the first “negation” of the form of private property. This progressive “negation” is expressed in the form of antagonism between human being and nature, between human being and human being, and between human being and society. The vital, emotional, and aesthetic significance of nature for the human being disappears entirely. With the development of capitalist production, the capitalist mode of production naturally generates the conditions for its own demise: the trend toward large-scale socialized production, the intensification of the basic contradiction of capitalist society, and the emergence of the proletariat drive the form of private property toward the “negation of the negation”—the stage of “re-establishing individual property” on the basis of the existing achievements of capitalism. This “re-establishment” signifies the advent of communist society.

自然复活的条件是从私有制下的资本统治中解放出来。“私有制作为社会的、集体的所有制的对立物，只是在劳动资料和劳动的外部条件属于私人的地方才存在。”原始社会解体之后，人类社会首先经历了最简单的私有制形式即劳动者以自身劳动为基础小规模占有生产资料的小私有制。小私有制条件下的劳动三要素融为一体，劳动过程分散而简单，个人通过劳动与自然互动，勾画了一幅田园牧歌式的、亲近自然的生产图景。从自然经济到小商品经济，从小商品生产者的两极分化到资本主义商品经济的确立，以资为本的社会发展到一定程度，小私有制“就产生出消灭它自身的物质手段”。质言，随着资本积累的进行，随着竞争中激烈的两极分化，多数小生产者的财产并入到少数资本家的大财产中，分散的小私有制转化为聚集的大私有制。马克思将其称为私有制形态的第一次“否定”。这种进步性的“否定”以人与自然对抗、人与人对抗、人与社会对抗的方式表达出来。自然界对人的生命性情感、审美意义消失殆尽。随着资本主义生产的发展，资本主义生产方式自然衍生出其消亡的条件——社会化大生产趋势、资本主义社会基本矛盾的激化以及无产阶级的产生，推动私有制形态迈向“否定之否定”——在资本主义现有成就的基础上“重新建立个人所有制”阶段。这一“重建”,意味着共产主义社会的来临。

We cannot directly see Marx’s description of the future state of nature from the literal surface of the text, but this by no means implies that Marx was indifferent to the future problem of nature. Rather, he clearly recognized that only by revealing the laws of motion of capitalist social production could the fundamental path to resolving the antagonism among human being, nature, and society be found. After penetrating the law of self-negation necessarily resulting from the movement of the law of surplus value in the capitalist economic movement, the communist depiction of the relationship between human being and nature is no longer a value-based postulate but a trend-oriented indication. In the future communist society, “the associated producers, the socialized human beings, will rationally regulate their metabolic interaction with nature, bringing it under their common control, instead of letting it rule them as a blind force; they will accomplish this metabolic interaction with the least expenditure of energy, under conditions most worthy of and most appropriate to their human nature.”

我们无法直接从文字表面上看到马克思对未来自然状态的描述，但这绝不意味着马克思疏离自然的未来问题。而是他清晰地认识到，只有揭示资本主义社会生产的运动规律，才能找到解决人、自然与社会对抗问题的根本路径。在透视到资本主义经济运动由于剩余价值规律运动必然导致的自我否定规律之后，共产主义对人和自然关系的描绘就不再是价值性的设定，而是趋势性的指向。未来共产主义社会中，“社会化的人，联合起来的生产者，将合理地调节他们和自然之间的物质变换，把它置于他们的共同控制之下，而不让它作为一种盲目的力量来统治自己；靠消耗最小的力量，在最无愧于和最适合于他们的人类本性的条件下来进行这种物质变换”。

IV. The Practical Wisdom of the Ecological View of Chinese-Path Modernization

四、中国式现代化生态观的实践智慧

General Secretary Xi Jinping has pointed out: “Chinese-path modernization is the modernization of harmony between humanity and nature.” “The unique world view, values, view of history, view of civilization, view of democracy, view of ecology, etc., contained in Chinese-path modernization, and its great practice, represent a major innovation in the theory and practice of world modernization.” [22]22 Xi Jinping, “Speech at the Opening Ceremony of the CPC in Dialogue with World Political Parties High-Level Meeting” (March 15, 2023), *People’s Daily*, March 16, 2023. Examining the ecological view of Chinese-path modernization in light of the deductive analysis of the relationship among nature, labor and capital carried out in *Capital* and its manuscripts thus takes on a special significance. The ecological view of Chinese-path modernization, as “the crystallized unity of Xi Jinping’s thought on ecological civilization and the theory of Chinese-path modernization,” [23]23 The original Chinese text cites this as a quotation; the source is not specified in the article. inherits and develops Marx and Engels’s overall view of the relationship between capitalist modern industrial development and nature, enriches and innovates the socialist view of ecological civilization, and its essential content of “harmony between humanity and nature” signals that China is making great strides in transforming the ecological concept within modernization, striving to break free from the logic of capitalist industrialization, shatter the growth myth in the modernization process, and find, at the ecological level, a path that can adapt to and sustain the development of Chinese-path modernization.

习近平总书记指出：“中国式现代化是人与自然和谐共生的现代化。”“中国式现代化蕴含的独特世界观、价值观、历史观、文明观、民主观、生态观等及其伟大实践，是对世界现代化理论和实践的重大创新。”依据《资本论》及其手稿对自然、劳动与资本关系所展开的演绎分析，反观中国式现代化生态观，也就有了特别的意味。中国式现代化生态观作为“习近平生态文明思想和中国式现代化理论的相统一的思想结晶”,继承和发展了马克思恩格斯关于资本主义现代工业发展与自然关系的总体观点，丰富和创新了社会主义生态文明观点，其“人与自然和谐共生”的本质内容表征中国正在大步变革现代化建设中的生态观念，努力跳出资本主义工业化发展逻辑，打破现代化进程中的增长迷思，在生态层面找寻可适应和承载中国式现代化发展的路径。

1. The theoretical benchmark of the ecological view of Chinese-path modernization lies in fully recognizing that humanity and nature are a community of life

1.中国式现代化生态观的理论基准点在于充分认识到人与自然是生命共同体

How the relationship between humanity and nature is scientifically positioned directly determines the evolutionary direction of the social formation and the future prospects of modernization. From the deification of nature in fishing-and-hunting civilization, to the dependence on nature in agricultural civilization, and then to the conquest of nature in industrial civilization, accompanied by the frenzy of industrial production and the deployment of capitalist globalization, the Western developed capitalist countries led by the United States have pushed forward modernization at full speed, forming a Western modernization model that is extremely “successful” at the economic level. Realizing the value of modernization should have been a beautiful result longed for by humanity. However, because Western modernization pursues only economic speed while disregarding natural consequences, follows only the measure of things while ignoring the measure of human beings, and seeks only intra-generational value while neglecting inter-generational value, it has led to an exponential growth in productive forces while the frequency of natural and social crises has also reached an unprecedented level. Moreover, Western developed capitalist countries continuously shift the ecological crisis onto developing and underdeveloped countries through neo-colonialism, forcing the latter to bear the “sinful” consequences of this crisis. Marx offered a penetrating critique of this point.

如何科学定位人与自然的关系，直接决定社会形态的演化趋向和现代化发展的未来前景。从渔猎文明的自然神化到农业文明的自然依附，再到工业文明的自然征服，伴随着工业生产的狂飙和资本主义全球化的布展，以美国为首的西方发达资本主义国家全速推进现代化进程，形成了在经济层面极为“成功”的西方现代化模式。实现现代化价值，本应是人类梦寐以求的美好结果。然而，西方现代化由于只追求经济速度而不计自然后果、只遵循物的尺度而忽视人的尺度、只谋求代内价值而不顾代际价值，导致在生产力呈指数型增长的同时，自然危机和社会危机的爆发频次也达到了前所未有的程度。另外，西方发达资本主义国家还不断通过新殖民主义把生态危机转嫁给发展中国家和欠发达国家，让后者为其负担这场“罪恶”的后果。关于这点，是马克思鞭辟入里地批判过的。

The demands of development determine that China cannot stand outside the process of world modernization. The demands of sustained development determine that China absolutely cannot long copy the world’s most “popular” Western modernization model, characterized by high rates of extraction, consumption and pollution. To keep pace with world modernization while conforming to China’s own natural ecological conditions, it is necessary to innovate the modernization model. The proposal of the modernization of harmony between humanity and nature in the report of the 20th National Congress of the CPC [24]24 The 20th National Congress of the CPC was held in October 2022. The report formally proposed “the modernization of harmony between humanity and nature” as a defining feature of Chinese-path modernization. signals the diversity of world modernization paradigms, the inevitability of their transformation, and the selectability of Chinese-path modernization. The proposition of “the modernization of harmony between humanity and nature” first accomplishes a revolutionary innovation in values, elevating the one-sided value standard of “humanity is the master of nature” in Western capitalist modernization to the new value concept of “humanity and nature are a community of life”; it redefines the significance of the natural world in the modernization process, elevating nature, which in Western capitalist modernization was merely a “subject matter” used for monetary calculation, into a “supporting basis” for humanity’s sustainable development. Comrade Xi Jinping has repeatedly emphasized: “Humanity and nature are a community of life; endlessly extracting from or even destroying nature will inevitably invite nature’s revenge.” [25]25 Xi Jinping, “Speech at the National Conference on Ecological and Environmental Protection” (May 18, 2018), *People’s Daily*, May 19, 2018. Since for humanity, nature does not exist as an opposing “other,” but as a co-existence within the same life system, then humanity must actively lower its “master” identity in action, assume the principal responsibility for promoting harmony between humanity and nature, respect the objectivity and priority of nature’s existence, conform to the laws of nature’s movement and change, preserve the beauty of nature’s original ecology, and create the beauty of an artificial natural environment, so as to achieve a new resetting and genuine reconciliation of the relationship between humanity and nature in the era of ecological civilization.

发展的要求决定中国无法站在世界现代化进程之外。持久发展的要求决定中国决不能长久照搬世界上最为“流行”的、以高开采率、高消耗率和高污染率为特征的西方现代化模式。要想既跟紧世界现代化步伐，又符合我国自然生态国情，必须对现代化模式进行创新。党的二十大报告中人与自然和谐共生的现代化的提出，表征了世界现代化范式的多样性和转化必然性以及中国式现代化的可供选择性。“人与自然和谐共生的现代化”命题，首先完成了价值观念上的革命性创新，其将西方资本主义现代化中“人是自然的主人”的片面价值标准提升为“人与自然是生命共同体”的新型价值理念；重新定义了自然界在现代化进程中的意义，将西方资本主义现代化中仅是用于金钱计算“标的物”的自然界提升为人类实现永续发展的“依托物”。习近平同志多次强调：“人与自然是生命共同体，无止境地向自然索取甚至破坏自然必然会遭到大自然的报复。”既然对于人类而言，自然界不是与其相对的“他者”的存在，而是在同一生命系统中的共同存在，那么，人类在行动上要主动沉降“主宰者”身份，承担起推进人与自然和谐共生的主体责任，尊重自然界存在的客观性和优先性，顺应自然界运动变化的规律性，维护好自然界原生态之美，创造好人工自然环境之美，以实现人与自然关系在生态文明时代的全新复位和真正和解。

2. The practical entry point of the ecological view of Chinese-path modernization lies in comprehensively unfolding socialist ecological labor

2.中国式现代化生态观的现实切入点在于全面展开社会主义生态劳动

Labor is the original form of the relationship between humanity and nature. In its essential sense, labor establishes a “two-way interdependence” in the relationship of interaction between humanity and nature. In the process of labor creation, where humanity objectifies its essential powers, it transforms nature in accordance with laws and purposes, reveres and accepts nature’s gifts, and causes nature to evolve in a direction that conforms both to its own evolutionary characteristics and to the survival nature of humanity. In this practice, the “humanization of nature” and the “naturalization of humanity” interact in both directions, and the state of harmony between humanity and nature is presented. However, this logic is manifested as “completely inverted” in capitalist society: human labor production practice, on the surface appearing as a rational choice to meet the survival and development needs of all humanity, is in essence only to satisfy the irrational desires of a few capitalists for unlimited profit. Capitalists use this labor to create alienated nature, alienated humanity, and alienated society. To restart the process of unifying “nature—humanity—society,” it is necessary to transcend labor that takes profit as its sole orientation and is anti-natural in existence, “by reconstructing the objectifying and verifying relationship among the laborer, the labor process, and the labor product, so that labor transcends its economic meaning.” [26]26 The original Chinese text cites this as a quotation; the source is not specified in the article.

劳动是人与自然关系的原初形式。从本然意义上讲，劳动建立人与自然交往关系的“双向依存”。人类在对象化其本质力量的劳动创造过程中，合规律性、合目的性地改造自然，敬畏和接受来自自然的馈赠，并使自然朝向符合自身演化特性和人类生存本性的方向演变。在这种实践中，“自然的人化”和“人的自然化”双向互动，人与自然和谐状态得以呈现。但是这种逻辑，在资本主义社会中体现为“完全倒置”:人类进行劳动生产实践，表面上看是出自满足全人类生存发展需要的理性选择，本质上只是为了满足少数资本家追求无限利益的非理性欲望。资本家以此劳动创造了异化的自然、异化的人、异化的社会。若要重新开启“自然——人类——社会”相统一的进程，需进阶以利益为唯一导向的、反自然存在的劳动，“通过重建劳动者、劳动过程、劳动产品之间的对象性和印证关系，使劳动超越它的经济意义”。

Socialist ecological labor practice differs in essence from the alienated labor dominated by the logic of capital. The “socialist” qualification of socialist ecological labor requires that labor become “positive labor that constructs a new form of human civilization according to the laws of beauty,” [27]27 The original Chinese text cites this as a quotation; the source is not specified in the article. while the “ecological” connotation emphasizes the realization of a benign material exchange between humanity and nature in practical activities. Together, these two aspects make possible the modernization of harmony between humanity and nature. Extending Marx’s logic of the three elements of the labor process (purpose, object, means), comprehensively unfolding socialist ecological labor practice requires simultaneous transformation in three aspects: labor purpose, labor subject, and labor process. First, a dual-directional labor purpose. Socialist ecological labor must aim both to meet the people’s needs for a beautiful ecological environment and high-quality ecological products, and to realize humanity’s long-term nurturing of nature. Second, an ecological labor subject. The comprehensive quality of the labor subject—such as knowledge level, values, and practical ability—is an important factor affecting the effectiveness of ecological labor. Therefore, it is necessary to strengthen ecological culture education for the labor subject, enabling them to master sufficient natural ecological knowledge, grasp more natural laws and ecological nature, and consciously and actively engage in ecological labor; targeted ecological labor skill training should be provided according to the division of labor among labor subjects. Third, green labor tools. Labor tools amplify the power of the labor subject over nature. To optimize the overall labor process, it is necessary to enhance the capacity for developing and applying green technologies, using the latest green technologies to improve traditional production techniques and increase the effective utilization rate of nature.

社会主义生态劳动实践在本质层次上区别于资本逻辑主导的异化劳动。社会主义生态劳动的“社会主义”限定要求劳动成为“按照美的规律来构造人类文明新形态的积极劳动”,“生态”内涵强调在现实性实践活动中实现人与自然之间的良性物质变换。二者共同成就人与自然和谐共生的现代化的可能性。引申马克思劳动过程三要素(目的、对象、资料)逻辑，全面展开社会主义生态劳动实践要在劳动目的、劳动主体、劳动过程三个方面同时转变。一是双向化的劳动目的。社会主义生态劳动既要以满足人民的优美生态环境需要和优质生态产品需要为目的，也要以实现人对自然的长久养育为目的。二是生态化的劳动主体。劳动主体的综合素养，如知识水平、价值观念、实践能力等，是影响生态劳动成效的重要因素。因而，要加强对劳动主体的生态文化教育，使其掌握足够的自然生态知识、把握更多的自然规律和生态本性，使其有意识的主动进行生态劳动；要根据劳动主体的分工，有针对性地进行生态劳动技能培训。三是绿色化的劳动工具。劳动工具放大劳动主体对自然的力量。欲优化整体劳动过程，需增强绿色技术的开发与运用能力，以最新绿色技术改进传统生产技艺，提升对自然的有效利用率。

3. The special key point of the ecological view of Chinese-path modernization lies in leveraging institutional advantages to steer the direction of capital development

3.中国式现代化生态观的特殊关键点在于发挥制度优势驾驭资本发展方向

Since the root cause of the unprecedented ecological crisis facing humanity is the logic of capital, fundamentally resolving this crisis requires completely eliminating the rule of the logic of capital and establishing a world without capital. But capital’s journey from non-existence to existence, from vigor to decline, from generation to extinction, is an objective historical process. Only when capital has realized its full historical capacity can it completely accomplish its self-negation. This is precisely the greatest practical significance of Marx’s critical theory of the logic of capital. Marx did not propose artificially dismantling capital or destroying capital, but rather advocated using capital itself, in a future stage of social development, to generate the factors that oppose capital. Therefore, capital should be viewed with a historical perspective and a dialectical lens; one must recognize both the negative effects of capital’s presence on nature, humanity and social development, and also harness the constructive power of capital to continue liberating and developing productive forces.

既然造成人类所面临的空前的生态危机的罪魁祸首是资本逻辑，那么，从根本上化解这一危机，就需要彻底消除资本逻辑的统治，建立一个无资本世界。但资本从无到有、从蓬勃到衰败、从生成到消亡是一个客观历史过程。资本只有实现其全部历史容量，才能彻底完成自我否定。这正是马克思资本逻辑批判理论最为重大的现实意义。马克思没有提出人为瓦解资本、摧毁资本，而是主张在未来社会发展阶段用资本自身来生成资本对立面的因素。因此，应以历史的眼光和辩证的视角看待资本，既要看到资本在场对自然、人类与社会发展的负面效应，又要借助资本的建设性力量继续解放和发展生产力。

The historical inertia of capital’s existence in the primary stage of socialism means that the modernization of the harmonious coexistence between humanity and nature cannot bypass the issue of capital. The specific character of the primary stage of socialism determines the pattern of ownership of the means of production in our country, which takes public ownership as the mainstay and allows the common development of multiple forms of ownership; it also determines the role of the socialist distribution system and the market economy system. In the primary stage of socialism, the preservation and appreciation of both public-sector and non-public-sector assets cannot be separated from capital accumulation, and the socialist market economy system further requires the indispensability of the capital market, yet capital has an innate impulse to pursue profit. Practice shows that in the primary stage of socialism, capital interests have a negative effect on nature. In the current period and for a long historical period to come, if we wish to transform the severe situation of the ecological environment into a form of harmonious coexistence between humanity and nature, the core issue is how to rationally and effectively harness capital — that is, how to “regulate capital behavior, seek benefits and avoid harms, neither allowing ‘capital sharks’ to act recklessly nor neglecting capital’s function as a factor of production.” The answer lies in relying on the advantages of the socialist system. Specifically, by relying on the Party’s centralized and unified leadership system and the system of the people being the masters of the country, we regulate the direction of capital’s development to serve the construction of a socialist economy with Chinese characteristics, guide capital’s value choice from “taking things as the foundation” to a people-centered approach, and ensure the people’s quality of life and free development while achieving wealth accumulation. By relying on the advantages of the basic socialist economic system, under the guidance of state-owned capital, we actively encourage, attract, and stimulate various capital forces to expand their investment forms and investment paths, appropriately target investment toward the natural ecological field, and create a new market atmosphere for natural capital investment; under the dominance of distribution according to work, we adjust social interest relations through secondary and tertiary distribution, effectively safeguard the fairness of the possession and distribution of ecological resources; under the dual regulation of an effective market and a capable government, we ensure appropriate production and appropriate consumption, thereby restraining capital’s desire for accumulation to a certain extent. By relying on the advantages of the socialist rule-of-law system with Chinese characteristics and the administrative system, we use institutional arrangements to force capital to fully consider ecological costs, set up “traffic lights” for capital operation according to policy, control the boundaries and limits of capital’s encroachment on natural resources and ecosystems, punish the disorderly expansion of capital that damages the ecological environment in accordance with laws and regulations, and do our utmost to make capital a useful tool for building the modernization of the harmonious coexistence between humanity and nature.

资本在社会主义初级阶段存在的历史惯性使得人与自然和谐共生现代化的建设绕不开资本问题。社会主义初级阶段的特定性存在决定了我国公有制为主体、多种所有制经济共同发展的生产资料所有制格局，也决定了社会主义分配制度和市场经济体制的作用。社会主义初级阶段公有制资产和非公有制资产的保值增值离不开资本积累，社会主义市场经济体制更要求资本市场的不可或缺，而资本却有天生的逐利冲动。实践表明，在社会主义初级阶段，资本利益存在着对自然界的负面作用。在当前以及未来很长的历史时期内，欲想转生态环境的严峻态势为人与自然和谐共生的形态，核心问题是如何理性有效地驾驭资本，即如何“规范资本行为，趋利避害，既不让‘资本大鳄’恣意妄为，又要发挥资本作为生产要素的功能”,答案在于依托社会主义制度优势。具体而言，依托党的集中统一领导制度体系和人民当家作主的制度体系，将资本的发展方向规制到服务中国特色社会主义经济建设上来，将资本的价值选择从“以物为本”导引至以人民为中心，在实现财富积累的同时保证人民的生活质量与自由发展。依托社会主义基本经济制度优势，在国有资本的引导下，积极鼓励、吸引、刺激各种资本力量主动扩展其投资形式与投资路径，将投资靶向适当地瞄准自然生态领域，营造出自然资本投资新业态的市场新氛围；在按劳分配的主导下，通过二、三次分配调节社会利益关系，切实维护生态资源占有和分配公正；在有效市场+有为政府的双重调控下，保证适当的生产、适当的消费，从而一定程度上抑制资本增殖欲望。依托中国特色社会主义法治体系优势和行政体制优势，通过制度安排倒逼资本充分考虑生态成本，依照政策设置资本运行“红绿灯”,控制资本对自然资源和生态系统的吞侵边界和限度，依据法律、法规惩治破坏生态环境的资本无序扩张行为，尽最大努力使资本成为建设人与自然和谐共生的现代化的有益工具。

Online editor: Paul

网络编辑：保罗