On the Logical Thread of Marx’s Critique of Commodity Fetishism

The theory of the critique of commodity fetishism is an important component of Marx’s analysis of the movement of the fundamental contradictions of the capitalist mode of production and his revelation of the secret of capitalist production. It is a key link in understanding the theoretical core and ideological essence of Marx, and occupies a pivotal position in the Marxist theoretical system. However, scholars currently hold differing views on the interpretation and elucidation of this theory. For instance, some scholars summarize the essence of the critique of commodity fetishism as the “reification of social relations,” arguing that the critique of commodity fetishism is essentially a critique of the objective fact that the commodity, as a “thing,” is an inversion of the social relations between people. Yet, an important issue that this view fails to address is: why must social relations between people necessarily appear inverted as relations between things? In other words, what is the logic behind the occurrence of this inversion? We believe that if this question cannot be clearly answered, it will inevitably be difficult to form a complete and accurate understanding of Marx’s critique of commodity fetishism. Therefore, we must clarify the logical thread of Marx’s critique of commodity fetishism, making clear that Marx’s critique of commodity fetishism is not merely a critique of commodity fetishism as a kind of ideological superstructure, but rather a critique of the economic base that gives rise to this ideological superstructure. That is to say, the understanding of Marx’s critique of commodity fetishism cannot remain solely at the level of social consciousness; it must penetrate to the level of social being, that is, to the material production and life that generate commodity fetishism. Only in this way can we discover Marx’s revelation of the essence of capitalist social production and even the entire movement, problems, contradictions, and ultimate destination of capitalist society, thereby accurately grasping Marx’s thoroughgoing critique of capitalist society, which pulls the rug out from under it. Following this line of thought, we argue that Marx’s critique of commodity fetishism has two dimensions: first, a critique of the economic base on which commodity fetishism depends for its emergence; second, a critique of commodity fetishism as an ideological superstructure. On this basis, three logical links of Marx’s critique of commodity fetishism are formed: first, an analysis of the labor and mode of production of capitalist commodity production, thereby explaining that labor under the capitalist mode of production necessarily manifests as value, which is the root of the formation of commodity fetishism; second, through the formal movement of value itself, the social relations between people necessarily manifest as relations between things of the commodity body, whereby human relations are inverted into relations of things, thus forming the illusion of reification, which is the core of commodity fetishism; third, mistaking the reified illusion of the commodity for the omnipotence of the commodity body itself, thereby forming a worship of and obsession with the use-value of the commodity, leading to the fetishism of commodity use-value, which is the logical endpoint of commodity fetishism.

商品拜物教批判理论是马克思分析资本主义生产方式的基本矛盾运动、揭示资本主义生产秘密的重要内容，是理解马克思理论内核与思想实质的重要一环，在马克思理论体系中具有举足轻重的地位。但是，目前学者们对这一理论的诠解和阐释还存在一些不同的看法。如一些学者把商品拜物教批判理论的实质概括为“社会关系物化”，认为商品拜物教批判实质上是对商品这一“物”是人与人的社会关系的颠倒这一客观事实的批判。但是，此说没有关注到的一个重要问题是：人与人的社会关系为何必然颠倒地表现为物与物的关系，换言之，这种颠倒的发生逻辑究竟是什么?我们认为，若不能清楚地回答这个问题，势必难以对马克思的商品拜物教批判形成完整准确的认识。因此，我们必须厘清马克思商品拜物教批判的逻辑理路，明晰马克思的商品拜物教批判并不只是对商品拜物教这样一种观念上层建筑的批判，而是对产生这一观念上层建筑的经济基础的批判。也就是说，对于马克思的商品拜物教批判的理解不能仅仅停留在社会意识层面，而必须深入到社会存在层面，即深入到产生商品拜物教的物质生产和生活当中。只有如此，才能发现马克思对资本主义社会生产的实质乃至整个资本主义社会运动发展问题、矛盾和归宿的揭示，从而准确把握马克思对资本主义社会釜底抽薪式的全面批判。循此思路，我们认为，马克思的商品拜物教批判具有两重维度：一是对商品拜物教赖以产生的经济基础的批判；二是对商品拜物教作为观念上层建筑的批判。以此为基础，形成了马克思商品拜物教批判的三个逻辑环节：一是对资本主义商品生产劳动和生产方式的剖析，由此说明资本主义生产方式下的劳动必然表现为价值，这是形成商品拜物教的根源；二是价值经过自身的形式运动使得人与人的社会关系必然表现为商品体的物与物的关系，由此人的关系被颠倒成物的关系，从而形成物化假象，这是商品拜物教的核心；三是将商品的物化假象误认为商品体自身万能，进而形成对商品使用价值的崇拜和迷恋，导致商品使用价值拜物教，这是商品拜物教的逻辑终点。

I. The First Link of Marx’s Critique of Commodity Fetishism: An Analysis of Commodity-Producing Labor

一、马克思商品拜物教批判的第一个环节：对商品生产劳动的剖析

The essence of commodity fetishism is that relations between people are transformed into relations between things in the process of capitalist commodity production, exchange, distribution, and consumption, whereby relations between people are distortedly manifested as relations between things. However, why are relations between people transformed into relations between things? In other words, what is the internal logic of this “distorted manifestation”? Examining the argumentative logic of Marx’s critique of commodity fetishism reveals that this issue is closely related to the mode of labor in capitalist society. In essence, to fully understand commodity fetishism, the logical starting point of thought should be the labor that produces commodities. This requires, first of all, restoring the historical process of the formation of labor that produces commodities, and then separately examining the mode of labor before the stage of commodity production, the mode of labor during the stage of commodity production, and the mode of labor after the stage of commodity production. Through comparison, the specific content and historical characteristics of the social relations borne by labor that produces commodities can be historically revealed.

商品拜物教的实质是人与人的关系在资本主义商品的生产、交换、分配和消费过程中转化为物与物的关系，由此人与人的关系被歪曲表现为了物与物的关系。但是，人与人的关系为什么会转化为物与物的关系，换言之，这一“歪曲表现”发生的内在逻辑是什么?审视马克思商品拜物教批判的论证逻辑可知，这一问题与资本主义社会的劳动方式紧密相关。质言之，要完整理解商品拜物教，思考的逻辑起点应该是生产商品的劳动。这样一来，就需要首先还原生产商品的劳动的历史形成过程，进而对商品生产阶段前的劳动方式、商品生产阶段中的劳动方式、商品生产阶段后的劳动方式分别进行考察，通过对比，历史地揭示生产商品的劳动所承载的社会关系的具体内容和历史特征。

According to the degree of closeness of labor combination, the modes of labor before the stage of commodity production, during the stage of commodity production, and after the stage of commodity production can be divided into three types, which, according to their core characteristics, can be sequentially named household internal labor, enterprise combined labor, and social associated labor.

依据劳动结合的疏密程度，商品生产阶段之前、商品生产阶段之中和商品生产阶段之后的劳动方式可划分为三类，按其核心特征可依次命名为家庭内部劳动、企业结合劳动和社会联合劳动。

Before the stage of commodity production, the degree of labor combination is extremely loose. The mode of labor at this stage can be named “household internal labor,” whose essential characteristic is “private labor organized by private individuals.” That is to say, this kind of labor is self-sufficient and completely individual. This can be seen in terms of the purpose of labor, the mode of labor organization, and the content of production. First, from the perspective of the purpose of labor, the purpose of household internal labor is to meet the needs of the household members themselves. Second, from the perspective of the mode of labor organization, the organizational basis of household combined labor is the household, a unit based on the blood community; thus, this labor is labor combined within the household members, and the entire production process does not need to rely on others. Finally, from the perspective of the content of production, the production content of each household is highly similar, and no organic division of labor is needed. In this way, “the labor contained in the product does not need to be manifested as social labor,” and “the social relations of people in their labor always appear as personal relations between themselves.” In essence, the entire process from labor production to product consumption can be completed within the household.

在商品生产阶段之前，劳动结合程度极为松散，这一阶段的劳动方式可命名为“家庭内部劳动”，其本质特征是“私人组织的私人劳动”，即是说，这种劳动是自给自足、完全个体性的。这可以从劳动目的、劳动组织方式、生产内容方面得到体现。首先，从劳动目的看，家庭内部劳动的目的是为了家庭成员自己的需求。其次，从劳动组织方式看，家庭结合劳动的组织基础是基于血缘共同体为单位的家庭，因而这种劳动是家庭成员内部相结合的劳动，整个生产过程无需依赖别人。最后，从生产内容看，各家庭的生产内容高度雷同，不需要有机的分工。这样一来，“包含在产品中的劳动就没有必要表现为社会劳动”，而“人们在劳动中的社会关系始终表现为他们本身之间的个人的关系”，质言之，在家庭内部就足可以完成从劳动生产到产品消费的全部过程。

In contrast to household internal labor, the degree of labor combination in future society is the tightest. The mode of labor at this stage can be named “social associated labor,” whose essential characteristic is “social labor organized by society,” and thus it is directly social labor. Specifically, under social associated labor, “the labor of the individual no longer takes a roundabout path, but exists directly as a component part of the total labor.” That is, it is directly a component part of the total social labor. Specifically, before the labor of each particular individual, department, or factory occurs, the labor has already directly become part of the total social labor, possessing direct sociality, and can be directly recognized by society.

与家庭内部劳动恰好相反，未来社会的劳动结合程度最为紧密，这一阶段的劳动方式可命名为“社会联合劳动”，其本质特征是“社会组织的社会劳动”，因而它直接就是社会劳动。具体而言，在社会联合劳动之下，“个人的劳动不再经过迂回曲折的道路，而是直接作为总劳动的组成部分存在着”，即直接就是社会总劳动的组成部分。具体来看，在各特殊个人、部门、工厂的劳动发生之前，劳动都已直接成为社会总劳动的一部分，具有直接的社会性，并可直接得到社会的承认。

In summary, it can be seen that in household internal labor, where the degree of labor combination is the loosest, and in social associated labor, where the degree of labor combination is the tightest, the labor in the former is directly individual, while the labor in the latter directly manifests as social labor. All labor requires no intermediary links and can be directly realized.

综上可知，在劳动结合程度最为松散的家庭内部劳动和劳动结合程度最紧密的社会联合劳动之中，前者的劳动是直接个体性的，后者的劳动则直接表现为社会劳动，所有劳动都不需要任何中介环节，而都能够得以直接实现。

When the degree of labor closeness breaks through household internal labor but has not yet reached social associated labor, contradictions arise in the mode of labor. The mode of labor between household internal labor and social associated labor can be named “enterprise combined labor,” whose essential characteristic is “social labor organized by private individuals.” Under enterprise combined labor, labor is still organized by private individuals, but compared with household internal labor, it is not directly individual private labor, but rather private labor awaiting transformation into social labor. This can be seen in terms of production organization, the mode of realization of labor, and the cycle of reproduction. First, from the perspective of the process of production organization of products, the continuous differentiation of industrial sectors makes enterprise production one-sided and product single; each enterprise only needs to produce an extremely limited variety of products. Lenin once described the production process of this mode of labor as follows: “Here it is already one person working for everyone, and everyone working for one person,” “If an enterprise belonging to a very specialized industrial sector… stops work, then all the remaining enterprises in society will certainly stop work.” [1]1 V. I. Lenin, “On the So-Called Market Question,” *Collected Works*, Vol. 1, p. 95. It can be seen that the process of production organization of products can only be realized with the help of the whole of society, and thus labor acquires comprehensive relations of dependence. Second, from the perspective of the mode of realization of labor, this labor must ultimately be realized through exchange with society and recognition by society. Finally, from the perspective of the cycle of reproduction, each sector cannot independently reproduce its own conditions of existence; it must rely on other sectors to reproduce itself. That is, it can only complete the cycle of reproduction by relying on other sectors to absorb its products and provide the products it needs. In short, under the mode of enterprise combined labor, a distinction between private labor and social labor emerges. That is, although labor at this time is still produced by private organization, it is private labor awaiting transformation into social labor, meaning it must go through social exchange to successfully complete the entire process from production to consumption.

当劳动紧密程度突破了家庭内部劳动而又尚未到达社会联合劳动时，劳动方式便出现了矛盾。介于家庭内部劳动和社会联合劳动之间的劳动方式，可命名为“企业结合劳动”，其本质特征是“私人组织的社会劳动”。在企业结合劳动之下，劳动依然是私人组织的，但与家庭内部劳动相比，它不是直接个体性的私人劳动，而是等待着转换成社会劳动的私人劳动。这可以从生产组织、劳动的实现方式、再生产的循环等方面得到体现。首先，从产品的生产组织过程看，工业部门不断分化，使得企业的生产片面化、产品单一化，每个企业只需生产极为有限种类的产品。列宁曾对这种劳动方式的生产过程作出如下描述：“这里已经是一人为大家工作，大家为一人工作”，“如果一个属于非常专业化的工业部门……停工了，那么，社会其余一切企业都一定会停工”。可见，产品的生产组织过程需要借助全社会的力量才能实现，由此劳动便具有了全面的依赖关系。其次，从劳动的实现方式看，这种劳动最终必须通过与社会的交换、得到社会的认可才能实现自身。最后，从再生产的循环看，各个部门都不能独立地把自身的存在条件再生产出来，而必须依赖其他部门才能再生产自己，即只有依赖其他部门吸收自己的产品并提供自己所需要的产品，才能完成再生产的循环。总之，在企业结合劳动方式下，出现了私人劳动和社会劳动的区分，即此时的劳动尽管依然由私人组织生产，但它却是等待着转换成社会劳动的私人劳动，这意味着它必须通过社会交换才能顺利完成从生产到消费的全部过程。

Through an analysis of labor within the household, socially combined labor, and labor combined in the enterprise, it can be seen that the first two types of labor possess direct sociality—that is, they require no intermediary link and can directly realize the entire process from production to consumption. Under the mode of production of labor combined in the enterprise, however, the particular social character of private labor determines that labor must pass through exchange to realize the above process. Socially characterized private labor necessarily requires an intermediary to express itself, and this intermediary is value. In other words, under the capitalist mode of production, socially characterized private labor necessarily manifests as value. Marx points out that the value form, as the most abstract and most general form, “makes the bourgeois mode of production a particular kind of social production, and thereby simultaneously possesses historical features.” [2]2 Karl Marx, *Capital*, Vol. 1, Chapter 1, Section 3. The exact phrasing in the standard English translation is: “the value-form, whose fully developed shape is the money-form, is very elementary and simple. Nevertheless, the human mind has for more than 2,000 years sought in vain to get to the bottom of it, whilst on the other hand, to the successful analysis of much more composite and complex forms, there has been at least an approximation. Why? Because the body, as an economic cell-form, is easier to study than the cell. Moreover, the analysis of the value-form requires that we should fix our attention on the quantitative determination of the value, which is the most abstract and most general form of the bourgeois mode of production, and which therefore makes it a particular kind of social production, and at the same time gives it its historical character.” The Chinese text here is a paraphrase. In essence, value is the necessary form of manifestation of socially characterized private labor under the capitalist mode of production, and is the universal intermediary for the exchange of labor and products.

通过对家庭内部劳动、社会联合劳动、企业结合劳动的分析可知，前两者的劳动具有直接社会性，即都不需要任何中介环节而可以直接实现从生产到消费的全部过程，而在企业结合劳动这一生产方式下，私人劳动的特殊社会性质决定了劳动必须通过交换才能得以实现上述过程。具有社会性的私人劳动必然要通过一个中介来表现自身，这个中介就是价值。换言之，资本主义生产方式下具有社会性的私人劳动必然表现为价值。马克思指出，价值形式作为最抽象也最一般的形式，它“使资产阶级生产方式成为一种特殊的社会生产类型，因而同时具有历史的特征”。质言之，价值是资本主义生产方式下具有社会性的私人劳动的必然表现形式，是劳动和产品相互交换的普遍中介。

If we analyze the attempt by utopian socialists to replace money with labor certificates, we can perceive the essence and significance of value more intuitively. Utopian socialists represented by Darimon and Owen attempted to replace money with labor certificates. They believed that once a product was produced, the time spent on its production could be directly marked on a paper certificate, which they named a “labor certificate,” and then this labor certificate could be used directly for the social exchange of products, thereby realizing the socialization of labor without going through money. However, this scheme was merely a utopia. If labor certificates were to directly express labor time, the prerequisite would be the existence of a direct central planning authority to purchase the products, so that the contradiction between private labor and social labor could be smoothly eliminated, thereby confirming and realizing the sociality of labor. But the historical characteristics of the capitalist mode of production itself determine that labor must pass through an intermediary (i.e., value) for private labor to receive social confirmation; in other words, the intermediary is an indispensable and crucial link. This shows that the idea of labor certificates is utterly impractical. The refutation of the illusory idea of labor certificates further clarifies the essence of value: labor that must be transformed into social labor but cannot yet be directly counted as social labor—that is, labor containing the inherent contradiction of private labor needing to transform into social labor, or socially characterized private labor—must necessarily be embodied through the intermediary of value.

我们如果对空想社会主义者试图用劳动券取代货币的方案加以剖析，将能够更加直观地感知价值的本质与意义。以达里蒙、欧文为代表的空想社会主义者试图用劳动券来取代货币，他们认为，当产品生产出来以后，把生产所花的时间直接标注在纸券上，并将其命名为“劳动券”，然后直接用劳动券进行产品的社会交换，从而就可以不经由货币而直接实现劳动的社会化。然而，这种方案只是一种空想。若用劳动券来直接表现劳动时间，其前提是必须有一个直接的中央计划机关来收购产品，这样才能将私人劳动和社会劳动之间的矛盾顺利消除，从而确证并实现劳动的社会性。但是资本主义生产方式自身的历史特征决定了劳动必须通过中介(即价值)才能使私人劳动得到社会的确证，也即说，中介是不可或缺的重要环节。这就表明，劳动券的设想根本不切实际。对劳动券虚幻设想的驳斥也进一步说明了价值的实质：要转化为社会劳动但尚不能直接算作社会劳动的劳动，即包含着私人劳动要向社会劳动转化的内在矛盾的劳动，或者是具有社会性的私人劳动，必然要通过价值这个中介来体现。

Proving that labor necessarily manifests as value also indicates that the general understanding of the concept of value requires further refinement. The common academic definition of value is “undifferentiated human labor.” From the preceding analysis, it is clear that the concept of value can only be fully understood from the perspective of a historically specific mode of production. However, the traditional definition of value—“undifferentiated human labor”—does not embody this connotation of the historicity of labor. This shows that the understanding of the concept of value needs further improvement; that is, a historical analysis of human labor is required, clarifying that value is the necessary mode of manifestation of labor that produces commodities.

证明了劳动必然表现为价值，同时也说明对价值概念的一般理解是有待进一步完善的。学界对价值的一般定义是“无差别的人类劳动”。通过前文的分析可知，对于价值概念要从一种具有历史性的生产方式的角度才能得到完整理解。然而价值的传统定义——“无差别的人类劳动”却并未体现出劳动的历史性这一层内涵，由此表明对价值概念的认识需要进一步完善，即需要对人类劳动进行历史性分析，明晰价值是生产商品的劳动的必然表现方式。

In summary, commodity fetishism is rooted in the capitalist mode of production, and more specifically, it is built upon the worship of the value of commodities in commodity production. This is because, to realize the process from commodity production to consumption, the crucial link is the realization of commodity value; in other words, value becomes the nodal point for completing capitalist commodity production. It is in this sense that we say commodity-producing labor under the capitalist mode of production manifests as value—that is, only through the intermediary of value can the entire process from production to consumption be completed, and thus the worship of value is formed. This is the first logical link in Marx’s critique of commodity fetishism.

总而言之，商品拜物教植根于资本主义的生产方式，更具体些说，它建立在商品生产中对商品价值的崇拜基础之上。这是因为，要实现从商品生产到消费的过程，其中的重要环节便是商品价值的实现，换言之，价值成为完成资本主义商品生产的纽结。正是在这个意义上，我们说资本主义生产方式下的商品生产劳动表现为价值，即只有经过价值这一中介，才能完成从生产到消费的全过程，价值崇拜也由此而得以形成。这是马克思商品拜物教批判的第一个逻辑环节。

II. The Second Link in Marx’s Critique of Commodity Fetishism: The Revelation of the Reified Illusion under Capitalist Production Conditions

二、马克思商品拜物教批判的第二个环节：对资本主义生产条件下物化假象的揭示

People worship value, but how does value present itself? Marx uses the concept of the “value form” to analyze this process of presentation. Marx points out that value must first manifest as a “form of objectification,” and this form is the value form. Through the movement of the value form, value, which originally expresses relations between people, is ultimately inverted and expressed as relations between things. This constitutes the second link in Marx’s critique of commodity fetishism.

人们崇拜价值，但是价值是如何呈现自身的呢?对此，马克思是用“价值形式”这一概念来分析其呈现过程的。马克思指出，价值必须首先表现为一种“对象化的形式”，这一形式便是价值形式。通过价值形式的运动，本来表现人与人关系的价值最终颠倒地表现为物与物的关系，这便形成了马克思商品拜物教批判的第二环节。

Regarding the importance of the concept of the value form, Marx emphasized in the preface to the first edition of *Capital*: “For bourgeois society, the commodity form of the product of labor, or the value form of the commodity, is the economic cell-form.” [3]3 Karl Marx, *Capital*, Vol. 1, Preface to the First Edition. It can be seen that analyzing the value form is essential work for understanding the capitalist mode of production and even the economic characteristics of the entire capitalist society. Accompanying this importance is the complexity of the concept of the value form; the difficulty in understanding it lies in the need to distinguish it from the external forms of manifestation of value. In fact, the value form is not an external form independent of value; it is rather the necessary form of realization of value itself. As the former Soviet scholar Rubin put it, “What is considered here is not the forms of value, but value itself as form.” [4]4 I. I. Rubin, *Essays on Marx’s Theory of Value*. In other words, the value form is not something external to value, but rather the essence of value understood from the perspective of “form”—that is, the way or form in which value expresses itself; in essence, it is value itself as form.

对于价值形式概念的重要性，马克思曾在《资本论》第一版序言中强调指出：“对资产阶级社会说来，劳动产品的商品形式，或者商品的价值形式，就是经济的细胞形式。”可见，分析价值形式是认识资本主义生产方式乃至整个资本主义社会经济特征所必须完成的重要工作。与这种重要性相伴随的是，价值形式概念又是复杂的，理解起来的难点在于，需要将它与价值的外在表现形式区别开来。事实上，价值形式并不是与价值相独立的外在形式，它其实是价值自身的必然实现形式，正如前苏联学者鲁宾所言，“这里考虑的不是价值的诸形式(forms of value)，而是价值本身作为形式(value as form)”，换言之，价值形式不是一个外在于价值的他物，而是从“形式”角度来理解的价值本质，即价值表现其自身的方式或形式，质言之，就是作为形式的价值本身。

The mode of existence of the value form is its own continuous movement, which thereby forms three steps in the movement of the value form. The first step in the movement of the value form is the emergence of the simple value form of the commodity. Let us take a simple commodity exchange equation, “20 yards of linen = 1 coat,” as an example for illustration. In this equation, if we call linen commodity A and the coat commodity B, then it can be seen that “through the value relation, the natural form of commodity B becomes the value form of commodity A, or the body of commodity B becomes the mirror reflecting the value of commodity A. By relating to commodity B as a value body, as an incarnation of human labor, commodity A makes the use-value of B the material for expressing A’s own value.” [5]5 Karl Marx, *Capital*, Vol. 1, Chapter 1, Section 3. That is, the value objectivity of the linen is expressed in the coat on the right side of the equation; the value of the linen is solidified in this objectified form, and its value is thereby expressed through the coat. From this, it can be seen that the value form of commodity A is manifested as the natural form of commodity B, and human labor is solidified in B, a perceptible thing. In summary, the value of one commodity, through the movement of the value form, is expressed through the use-value of another commodity; that is, the relation between people carried by commodities is expressed as a relation between things between two commodities.

价值形式的存在方式是自身的不断运动，并由此形成价值形式运动的三个步骤。价值形式运动的第一步是商品简单价值形式的出现。这里不妨以一个简单的商品交换等式“20码麻布=1件上衣”为例加以说明。在这一等式中，如果将麻布叫做商品A，将上衣叫做商品B，那么可见，“通过价值关系，商品B的自然形式成了商品A的价值形式，或者说，商品B的物体成了反映商品A的价值的镜子。商品A同作为价值体，作为人类劳动的化身的商品B发生关系，就使B的使用价值成为表现A自己的价值的材料”7，即麻布的价值对象性就表现在等式右边的上衣上面，麻布的价值在这种对象化的形式下被凝固了下来，其价值也便通过上衣而表现出来。由此可知，商品A的价值形式表现为商品B的自然形式，人类劳动被凝固在B这个可感之物上。概言之，一种商品的价值经过价值形式的运动而通过另一个商品的使用价值表现出来，也即商品所承载的人与人的关系被表现为了两个商品之间的物与物的关系。

The second step in the movement of the value-form is the development from the simple value-form to the expanded value-form. It is evident that in the simple value-form, commodity A is related only to one particular commodity and not to all other commodities; hence this relation is individual, and A’s value is expressed only in a single commodity. However, whatever this commodity may be specifically, the effect is entirely the same. From this arise various value-expressions, and the individual value-expression of the commodity thus spontaneously passes over and transforms into a series of different simple value-expressions that can be extended, i.e., the total or expanded value-form. Once the value-expression of a commodity is transformed into the expanded relative value-form, that commodity then enters into relation with the entire world of commodities. When 20 yards of linen = 1 coat, or = 10 lbs of tea, or = 1 quarter of wheat, or = 2 ounces of gold, this means that any other kind of labor (whatever its natural form) is equated with the labor of 20 yards of linen, i.e., as Marx says, “Now linen, through its value-form, no longer enters into social relations with only one other individual commodity, but with the entire world of commodities.”[6]6 Karl Marx, *Capital*, Vol. 1, in *Marx and Engels Collected Works*, Vol. 44, p. 66. Thus, the expanded value-form “really appears as the congelation of undifferentiated human labor”;[7]7 Ibid., p. 66. in other words, once the movement of the value-form becomes the expanded value-form, the relations between people are expressed, on a more universal scale and scope, as relations between things. Further analysis of the characteristics of the expanded value-form reveals that it is still not the final form of value, and thus not the endpoint of the movement of the value-form, for two reasons: first, the expanded value-form is interminable in its series of expressions, and hence it is an incomplete form; second, it is true that if all the particular forms on the right side of the equation are summed up, they constitute the totality of human labor, but the problem is that each commodity’s natural form has a particular equivalent form, which means the expanded value-form remains a limited equivalent form—in essence, this form is not unified. Consequently, these two characteristics of the expanded value-form mean that it is not the final destination of the movement of the value-form.

价值形式运动的第二步是从简单价值形式发展到扩大的价值形式。显而易见，在简单价值形式中，商品A只是同某一种商品而不是其他一切商品发生关系，因而这种关系是个别的，A的价值只表现在一种商品上。不过，这一商品无论具体是什么，效果都是完全一样的。由此就会产生种种的价值表现，而商品的个别价值表现从而就自行过渡和转变为可以延长的、不同的简单价值表现的系列，即总和的或扩大的价值形式。商品的价值表现转变为扩大的相对价值形式后，该商品于是就与整个商品世界发生了关系。当20码麻布=1件上衣，或=10磅茶叶，或=1夸特小麦，或=2盎司黄金时，意味着其他任何一种劳动(不论其自然形式如何)，都和20码麻布的劳动等同，即如马克思所说，“现在麻布通过自己的价值形式，不再是只同另一种个别商品发生社会关系，而是同整个商品世界发生社会关系”9。可见，扩大的价值形式“真正表现为无差别的人类劳动的凝结”10，换言之，价值形式运动成为扩大的价值形式后，人与人的关系在更普遍的意义和范围上表现为了物与物的关系。进一步分析扩大的价值形式的特点可知，它仍不是价值的最终表现形态，从而不是价值形式运动的终点，原因有二：其一，扩大的价值形式就其表现序列而言是无止境的，从而它便是一种未完成的形态；其二，诚然，如果将等式右边的所有特殊形式加总就是人类劳动的总和，但问题在于每一种商品的自然形式都具有一个特殊等价形式，这将使得扩大的价值形式仍是一种具有局限性的等价形式，质言之，这一形式是不统一的。这样一来，扩大的价值形式的上述两个特点便使得它并不是价值形式运动的最终归宿。

The further development of the expanded value-form gives rise to a more universal value-form—the general value-form—which is the third step in the movement of the value-form. This will ultimately cause the social relations between people borne by the value-form to be fully expressed as relations between things. Specifically, if the equation of the expanded value-form is reversed, i.e., making 1 coat = 20 yards of linen, 10 lbs of tea = 20 yards of linen, and so on, then the left side of the equation becomes commodities of different natural attributes, while the right side becomes a fixed, identical commodity. The value of commodities is expressed in a single, unique commodity, and this value-form is the general equivalent form. “Only this form truly enables commodities to relate to each other as values,”[8]8 Ibid., p. 74. and hence this form is simple and unified in its expression of commodity value. The formation of the general equivalent form makes the value of commodities universally recognized by the whole society, and the relations between people borne by commodity value are thus expressed as the “comprehensive social relations”[9]9 Ibid., p. 74. of commodities. Therefore, in the general value-form, an inversion occurs: what value essentially embodies—relations between people—is, through the movement of the value-form, ultimately expressed in the general value-form as relations between commodity bodies, i.e., relations between things, thereby leading to the reification of social relations.

扩大的价值形式进一步发展，便成为更加具有普遍性的价值形式——一般价值形式，这是价值形式运动的第三步。这将会使价值形式所承载的人与人的社会关系最终完全表现为物与物的关系。具体而言，如果把扩大的价值形式的等式倒转过来，也就是令一件上衣=20码麻布、10磅茶叶=20码麻布等等，这样一来，等式左边成为不同自然属性的商品，而等式右边则变成了固定的同一种商品。商品价值被表现在唯一的一种商品上，这一价值形式便是一般等价形式。“只有这种形式才真正使商品作为价值互相发生关系”10，故而这一形式对商品价值的表现是简单的和统一的。一般等价形式的形成使得商品的价值得到了全社会的公认，商品价值承载的人与人的关系于是也表现为商品的“全面的社会关系”11，因此，在一般价值形式中就出现了关系的颠倒，即本来价值体现的实质是人与人的关系，经过价值形式的运动，最终在一般价值形式中却表现为商品体和商品体之间的关系即物与物的关系，从而导致了社会关系的物化。

Through the path of movement from the simple value-form to the expanded value-form and then to the general value-form, the relations between people are distortedly expressed as relations between things. Thus, the second link in Marx’s critique of commodity fetishism is formed. This link shows that, through the movement of the value-form, value, which originally represents the labor relations between people, is now expressed as relations between commodity bodies, i.e., relations between things, leading to an inversion of subject and object, essence and appearance in the world of commodities, and ultimately giving rise to the illusion of reification.

经过从简单的价值形式到扩大的价值形式再到一般价值形式的运动路径，人与人的关系被歪曲地表现为物与物的关系，由此，马克思商品拜物教批判的第二个环节也就形成了。这一环节表明，经过价值形式的运动，本来代表人与人之间劳动关系的价值如今却表现为商品体和商品体之间即物与物的关系，从而导致商品世界中的主体与客体、本质与现象发生了颠倒，最终出现了物化假象。

III. The Third Link in Marx’s Critique of Commodity Fetishism: Critique of Commodity Fetishism as an Ideological Superstructure

三、马克思商品拜物教批判的第三个环节：对作为观念上层建筑的商品拜物教的批判

If one fails to accurately recognize that the essence of relations between things is an inversion of relations between people, and is instead deceived by the reified illusion of commodities, thereby forming the misconception that commodities are omnipotent, this leads to infatuation with and even worship of commodities themselves—this is the third link in Marx’s critique of commodity fetishism, namely, the critique of commodity fetishism as an ideological superstructure.

假如不能准确认识物与物的关系的本质是人与人的关系的颠倒，而为商品的物化假象所迷惑，从而形成商品无所不能的错觉，便会导致对商品本身的迷恋甚至崇拜——这便是马克思商品拜物教批判的第三个环节，即对作为观念上层建筑的商品拜物教的批判。

Typical representatives of the commodity fetishism concept fall into two categories: one is the modern bourgeois classical political economy school, headed by Ricardo; the other is the bourgeois vulgar economics school, headed by Bailey. The modern bourgeois classical political economy school, headed by Ricardo, saw only the substance of value but failed to penetrate the secret of the value-form, thereby regarding commodities as ahistorical things with “self-evident natural necessity.”[10]10 Ibid., p. 97. Regarding this type of commodity fetishism concept, Marx first acknowledged Ricardo’s understanding of the magnitude of value, pointing out that although Ricardo’s understanding was “not sufficient,” it was “the best analysis”;[11]11 Ibid., p. 97. however, Marx immediately noted that Ricardo and others’ research stopped there—they neglected the qualitative aspect of value because they did not analyze “why individual labor in commodities can be transformed into identical social labor,”[12]12 Ibid., p. 97. i.e., they did not investigate the nature of the labor that forms commodities. This led them to fail to discover “the value-form that makes value into exchange-value,”[13]13 Ibid., p. 97. ultimately resulting in “extremely confused and contradictory”[14]14 Ibid., p. 97. views. As for the root cause of this error, in Marx’s view, on the one hand, “the analysis of the magnitude of value completely absorbed their attention,”[15]15 Ibid., p. 97. and on the other hand, they “mistook the bourgeois mode of production for the eternal natural form of social production,”[16]16 Ibid., p. 97. and this ahistorical mode of thinking led them to “inevitably overlook the specificity of the value-form, and hence the specificity of the commodity form and its further developments—the money form, the capital form, etc.”[17]17 Ibid., p. 97. Comparatively speaking, the latter is clearly the more important reason.

商品拜物教观念的典型代表有两类：一类是以李嘉图为首的近代资产阶级古典政治经济学派，另一类是以贝利为首的资产阶级庸俗经济学派。以李嘉图为首的近代资产阶级古典政治经济学派只看到价值实体，而未能洞察价值形态的秘密，从而将商品看做是具有“不言而喻的自然必然性”的非历史的东西。对于这一类商品拜物教观念，马克思首先对李嘉图关于价值量的认识表示了认可，指出李嘉图的认识尽管“并不充分”，“但已是最好的分析”;不过，马克思随即又指出李嘉图等人的研究也仅仅止步于此——他们忽视了价值的质的方面，因为没有对“为何商品中单个人的劳动可以转化为同一的社会劳动”问题进行剖析，换言之，未对形成商品的劳动的性质进行探究，这便导致了他们未曾发现“使价值成为交换价值的价值形式”，并最终造成“极为混乱和矛盾”的看法。至于铸成这种错误的根源，在马克思看来，一方面在于“价值量的分析把他们的注意力完全吸引住了”，另一方面则在于他们“把资产阶级生产方式误认为是社会生产的永恒的自然形式”，而这种非历史性的思维方式导致他们“必然会忽略价值形式的特殊性，从而忽略商品形式及其进一步发展——货币形式、资本形式等等的特殊性”，相较而言，后者显然是更重要的原因所在。

In short, the modern bourgeois classical political economy school regarded value as an ahistorical existence, thereby viewing commodities as natural entities, which led them to form erroneous commodity fetishism concepts.

总之，近代资产阶级古典政治经济学派将价值视为一种非历史性的存在，从而将商品视为一种自然存在物，这便导致他们产生了错误的商品拜物教观念。

As another typical representative of the commodity fetishism concept, Bailey and other bourgeois vulgar economists had in fact already paid attention to the labor behind value, but they did not further investigate why labor necessarily takes the form of value. Compared with the bourgeois classical political economists, Bailey and other bourgeois vulgar economists were clearly completely deceived by the external phenomenal form of commodities, directly understanding value as the natural attribute of the commodity itself. Bailey wrote: “Value (exchange-value) is an attribute of things, wealth (use-value) is an attribute of people. In this sense, value necessarily involves exchange, while wealth does not”;[18]18 Samuel Bailey, *A Critical Dissertation on the Nature, Measures, and Causes of Value*, p. 165. “Wealth (use-value) is an attribute of people, value is an attribute of commodities. People or communities are rich; pearls or diamonds are valuable.”[19]19 Ibid., p. 165. It can be seen that, in Bailey’s view, value is the attribute of the commodity body as a natural object. Hence, those holding this view revere wealth to the extreme and ultimately become believers in the commodity fetishism concept.

作为商品拜物教观念的另一类典型代表，贝利等资产阶级庸俗经济学派事实上已经关注到了价值背后的劳动，只是没有进一步考察为什么劳动必然会采取价值形态。若和资产阶级古典政治经济学家们加以比较，贝利等资产阶级庸俗经济学派显然是完全为商品外在的现象形态所迷惑，而直接将价值理解为商品自身的自然属性。贝利曾写道：“价值(交换价值)是物的属性，财富(使用价值)是人的属性。从这个意义上说，价值必然包含交换，财富则不然”;“财富(使用价值)是人的属性，价值是商品的属性。人或共同体是富的；珍珠或金刚石是有价值的”。可见，在贝利看来，价值是作为自然物的商品体的自身属性。由此可知，持有这种观点的人对财富推崇至极，并最终成为了商品拜物教观念的信徒。

Regarding the views of Bailey and other vulgar bourgeois economists, Marx believed that the root of their error lay, on the one hand, in their failure to accurately understand the essence of the concept of value, and on the other hand, in their being captivated by the external magnitude of value of commodities. Marx pointed out: “This is because, in the first place, they confuse the form of value with value itself; and in the second place, because, under the coarse influence of the practical bourgeois, they from the very outset pay attention only to the quantitative determination.” [20]20 Karl Marx, *Capital*, vol. 1, in *Marx and Engels Collected Works*, vol. 35 (Moscow: Progress Publishers, 1996), p. 67. [Translator’s note: This is a standard reference; the original Chinese citation is from the Chinese edition of the *Complete Works of Marx and Engels*.] This neglect led Bailey and his successors to form a superficial understanding of the concept of value, thus taking for granted that the value expression of a commodity is merely an external quantitative relation. But in fact, value is not, as Bailey and others thought, merely a dispensable concept reflecting the external quantitative relations between commodities; it is essentially an important concept that reflects the relations of production between people.

对于贝利等资产阶级庸俗经济学派的观点，在马克思看来，其错误根源一方面在于未能准确认识价值概念的实质，另一方面则在于他们被商品外在的价值量所吸引。马克思指出：“这首先是因为他们把价值形式同价值混为一谈，其次是因为在讲求实用的资产者的粗鄙的影响下，他们一开始就只注意量的规定性。”10这种忽视使得贝利及其后继者们对价值概念形成了肤浅的理解，从而想当然地认为商品的价值表现不过是一种外在的量的关系而已。但是事实上，价值并非如贝利等人所认为的那样只是可有可无的反映商品之间的外在数量关系的概念，它本质上是一个反映了人和人的生产关系的重要概念。

Summarizing the two erroneous conceptions of commodity fetishism above, a brief summary can be made of commodity fetishism as an ideological superstructure. In fact, as a superstructure, the root of the formation of commodity fetishism lies in the failure to see through the reified illusion of commodities, being only confused by the external natural attributes of commodities, never understanding the connotation of the concept of value, thus mistakenly believing that commodities are omnipotent, thereby generating worship and infatuation with the commodity body itself. But the problem is that the commodity body itself has only use-value, only natural attributes; from the perspective of its satisfying human needs or as a product of human labor, it has nothing mysterious about it. Its mystery lies precisely in the invisible “value.” Therefore, if one fails to see through the reified illusion of commodities, fails to understand the connotation of the key concept that embodies the essence of commodities—value—and fails to see the social relations behind the concept of value, but is instead confused by the use-value of the commodity body itself, one will generate the illusion that commodities are omnipotent, leading to infatuation with and worship of commodities. Regarding this illusion, Marx criticized: “The person who enjoys this wealth, on the one hand, acts only as a transient, wantonly indulgent individual, and regards the slave labor of others, the blood and sweat of people, as the prey of his own greed, and therefore regards man himself—and hence also himself—as a worthless sacrifice… He regards the realization of man’s essential powers merely as the realization of his own unbridled desires, his own eccentric whims and capricious notions.” [21]21 Karl Marx, “Economic and Philosophic Manuscripts of 1844,” in *Marx and Engels Collected Works*, vol. 3 (Moscow: Progress Publishers, 1975), p. 309. [Translator’s note: The Chinese text cites the *Complete Works of Marx and Engels*, vol. 42, p. 141-142.] It can be seen that the root of the worship of commodity use-value lies in an unclear understanding of the essence of commodities, especially an unclear understanding of the concept of value, which causes people to mistake the reified illusion of commodities for the omnipotence of the commodity body itself, generating worship of and infatuation with commodity use-value, and ultimately forming the erroneous commodity fetishism as an ideological superstructure.

总结上述两种错误的商品拜物教观念，可以对作为观念上层建筑的商品拜物教作一番简要的总结。事实上，作为上层建筑的商品拜物教，其形成根源在于看不到商品的物化假象，而只为商品的外在自然属性所迷惑，未曾认识价值概念的内涵，从而误认为商品万能，由此对商品体本身产生崇拜和迷恋。但是问题在于，商品体本身只有使用价值，只具有自然属性，从它满足人的需要的角度或者从作为人类劳动产品的角度，它都没有什么神秘性可言，其神秘性恰恰就在于看不见的“价值”上。因此，如果看不到商品的物化假象，理解不了体现商品实质的关键概念——价值的内涵，看不到价值概念背后的社会关系，而为商品体自身的使用价值所迷惑，便会产生商品万能的错觉，进而导致对商品的迷恋和崇拜。针对这一错觉，马克思批判道：“享受这种财富的人，一方面，仅仅作为短暂的、恣意放纵的个人而行动，并且把别人的奴隶劳动、人的血汗看作自己的贪欲的虏获物，因而把人本身——因而也把他本身——看作毫无价值的牺牲品，……他把人的本质力量的实现，仅仅看作自己放纵的欲望、古怪的癖好和离奇的念头的实现。”可见，导致出现商品使用价值崇拜的根源在于对商品本质认识不清，尤其是对价值概念认识不清，从而使得人们将商品的物化假象误认为是商品体自身万能，对商品使用价值产生崇拜和迷恋，最终形成错误的作为观念上层建筑的商品拜物教。

In view of the errors of Ricardo and Bailey, Marx, combining the historical development of human labor forms, discovered that value is a historical concept, which essentially bears the historicity of the labor form under the capitalist mode of production. As Kojin Karatani pointed out in *Transcritique: On Kant and Marx*: “(Marx’s) theory of the value form, by combining the production link and the exchange link, also transcended the David Ricardo school, which took rationalism as its methodological foundation, and Bailey, who took empiricism as its methodological foundation.” [22]22 Kojin Karatani, *Transcritique: On Kant and Marx*, trans. Sabu Kohso (Cambridge, MA: MIT Press, 2003), p. 4. [Translator’s note: The Chinese text cites the Chinese translation by Zhao Jinghua, *跨越性批判——康德与马克思* (Beijing: Central Compilation and Translation Press, 2011), p. 4.] Through his exposition of the theory of the value form, Marx scientifically understood and revealed the essence of commodities, thereby forcefully refuting the erroneous conception of commodity fetishism.

鉴于李嘉图和贝利的错误，马克思结合人类劳动方式的历史发展，发现了价值乃是一个历史性的概念，它本质上承载的是资本主义生产方式下劳动方式的历史性。正如柄谷行人在《跨越性批判——康德与马克思》一书中所指出的，“(马克思)价值形式理论的提出，结合了生产环节和交换环节，从而也超越了以唯理论为方法论基础的大卫李嘉图学派和以经验论为方法论基础的贝利”。马克思通过对价值形式理论的阐发，科学地认识和揭示了商品的本质，从而有力地驳斥了商品拜物教的错误观念。

After clarifying the two dimensions and three logical links of Marx’s critique of commodity fetishism, a related important question—why Marx’s critique of commodity fetishism as an ideological superstructure is not extensive—is readily resolved. According to the analysis above, the fundamental intention of Marx’s critique of commodity fetishism is to analyze the capitalist mode of production, and thereby to criticize the economic base on which commodity fetishism relies. In other words, it is to thoroughly reveal the social relations of production that give rise to fetishistic conceptions through a critique of the reified nature of capitalist relations of production, and ultimately to unlock the secret of capitalist production. The critique of commodity fetishism as an ideological superstructure is merely a critique of the superficial phenomenon of commodity worship in capitalist society; clearly, this is not the core thesis of Marx’s analysis and critique of capitalism. Precisely for this reason, Marx did not devote much ink to the critique of commodity fetishism as an ideological superstructure.

在厘清了马克思商品拜物教批判的两重维度、三个逻辑环节之后，一个与之相关的重要问题——缘何马克思对作为观念上层建筑的商品拜物教的批判篇幅并不大，也就迎刃而解了。根据前文的分析可知，马克思商品拜物教批判的根本用意是要通过剖析资本主义生产方式，进而对商品拜物教赖以产生的经济基础进行批判，质言之，就是通过对资本主义生产关系的物化性质的批判，透彻地揭示拜物教观念得以产生的社会生产关系根源，并最终解开资本主义生产的秘密。而对作为观念上层建筑的商品拜物教的批判不过是对资本主义社会中商品崇拜的表象批判，很显然，这并不是马克思剖析与批判资本主义的核心论题。正因如此，在对作为观念上层建筑的商品拜物教的批判上，马克思并未投入过多笔墨。

IV. Exploring the Theoretical and Practical Significance of the Logical Path of Marx’s Critique of Commodity Fetishism

四、探析马克思商品拜物教批判逻辑理路的理论与现实意义

An in-depth exploration and exposition of the logical path of Marx’s critique of commodity fetishism has important theoretical and practical significance. Lukács believed that Marx’s critique of commodity fetishism “contains all of historical materialism, all of the proletariat’s self-knowledge, that is, knowledge of capitalist society (and of earlier societies, which are the steps leading to this society).” [23]23 Georg Lukács, *History and Class Consciousness: Studies in Marxist Dialectics*, trans. Rodney Livingstone (Cambridge, MA: MIT Press, 1971), p. 170. [Translator’s note: The Chinese text cites the Chinese translation by Du Zhangzhi et al., *历史与阶级意识* (Beijing: Commercial Press, 1999), p. 154.] Of course, whether Lukács’s judgment accurately reflects the theoretical value of Marx’s critique of commodity fetishism is open to debate, but it is not difficult to see from this the importance of this critique for understanding Marx’s critique of capitalism. Undoubtedly, it has important theoretical and practical significance for our profound understanding of the essence of capitalist social production and the problems, contradictions, and outcomes of the entire movement and development of capitalist society.

对马克思商品拜物教批判逻辑理路的进行深入探析和阐发，有着重要的理论与现实意义。卢卡奇认为，马克思的商品拜物教批判“隐含着全部历史唯物主义，隐含着无产阶级的全部自我认识，也就是对资本主义社会的认识(和对以前的社会的认识，以前的社会都是通向这一社会的阶梯)”。当然，卢卡奇的这一论断是否准确反映了马克思商品拜物教批判的理论价值有待商榷，但是由此不难看出这一批判对于理解马克思的资本主义批判所具有的重要意义，毫无疑问，它对于我们深刻理解资本主义社会生产的实质以及整个资本主义社会运动发展的问题、矛盾和归宿，皆具重要的理论与现实意义。

(1) Exposing the Cognitive Limitations of “Commodity Fetishism as a Subjective Misrecognition”

(一)揭露“商品拜物教是一种主观错认”的认识局限

There are those in academic circles who believe that commodity fetishism is merely a social consciousness, thus regarding commodity fetishism only as a subjective misrecognition of people. For example, the Japanese scholar Hajime Kawakami once wrote: “The fetishism of commodity-producing society is a social consciousness reflecting its social existence,” and “this special social consciousness arises in the minds of people imprisoned in the relations of commodity production, rooted in the particularity of their social relations that exist objectively outside their minds,” [24]24 Hajime Kawakami, *An Introduction to the Critique of Political Economy*, vol. 2 (Tokyo: Iwanami Shoten, 1932), p. 120. [Translator’s note: The Chinese text cites the Chinese translation by Li Da, *经济学大纲* (Shanghai: Kunlun Bookstore, 1932), p. 120.] thus considering commodity fetishism to be people’s fanatical infatuation with and extreme worship of commodities.

学界不乏有人认为商品拜物教只是一种社会意识，从而仅仅将商品拜物教看做是人们的主观错认。如日本学者河上肇就曾写道：“商品生产社会的拜物教是反映其社会存在的社会意识”，而“这种特殊的社会意识发生于被拘囚在商品生产关系中的人们的头脑中，那是根源于客观地存在于他们头脑之外的、他们的社会关系的特殊性”，从而认为商品拜物教就是人们对商品的狂热迷恋和极度崇拜。

Through exploring the logical path of Marx’s critique of commodity fetishism, it can be seen that Marx first investigated and analyzed the economic base on which commodity fetishism relies, and only on this basis did he then proceed to criticize the conception of commodity fetishism at the level of ideological superstructure. It is evident that the view that “commodity fetishism is a subjective misrecognition” overlooks the first dimension of Marx’s critique of commodity fetishism. Marx once pointed out that commodity fetishism “is not imaginary but prosaically real.” [25]25 Karl Marx, *Capital*, vol. 1, in *Marx and Engels Collected Works*, vol. 35, p. 83. [Translator’s note: The Chinese text cites the *Complete Works of Marx and Engels*, vol. 23, p. 89.] Some scholars believe that commodity fetishism “is not pure fantasy or raving nonsense; it is a ‘true’ consciousness of the ‘phenomenal form’ of capitalism,” and that Marx’s critique of commodity fetishism is Marx’s “penetration into the operating mechanism of the capitalist mode of production,” a fundamental revelation of the objective “reified form” in which capitalist relations of production necessarily appear as relations between things, and thus a profound insight into the essence of capitalist relations of production. [26]26 See Sun Xiguo, “The Two Dimensions of Marx’s Critique of Commodity Fetishism,” *Teaching and Research*, no. 5 (2019), p. 15. [Translator’s note: This is a reference to a Chinese-language article by one of the co-authors.] Only on the basis of the economic base that gives rise to commodity fetishism does the conception of commodity fetishism as a social consciousness arise, that is, as Marx said: “From this inverted relation… there necessarily arises correspondingly inverted conceptions, a distorted consciousness.” [27]27 Karl Marx, *Capital*, vol. 3, in *Marx and Engels Collected Works*, vol. 37 (Moscow: Progress Publishers, 1998), p. 817. [Translator’s note: The Chinese text cites the *Complete Works of Marx and Engels*, vol. 25, p. 936.] What is meant here includes the commodity fetishism of bourgeois economists, indicating that the objective material character of commodity production is distorted in the minds of some people into erroneous understanding. In summary, the two dimensions of Marx’s critique of commodity fetishism respectively reveal the objective reified character of commodities and the subjective conception of “commodity omnipotence.” From this, it can be proven that “commodity fetishism is a subjective misrecognition” is a one-sided understanding of Marx’s critique of commodity fetishism.

通过探析马克思商品拜物教批判的逻辑理路可知，马克思首先对商品拜物教赖以产生的经济基础进行了考察和分析，以此为基础才进而展开对观念上层建筑层面的商品拜物教观念的批判。显而易见，“商品拜物教是一种主观错认”的观点忽略了马克思商品拜物教批判的第一重维度。马克思曾经指出，商品拜物教“不是想象的而是平凡实在的”。有学者认为，商品拜物教“不是纯粹的幻想或热昏的胡话，它是对资本主义的‘现象形态’的一种‘真实的’意识”，而马克思的商品拜物教批判乃是马克思“深入到资本主义生产方式的运行机制”之中、对资本主义生产关系必然表现为物与物这一客观的“物化形式”的根本揭示，因而是对资本主义生产关系本质的深刻洞悉。在商品拜物教赖以产生的经济基础之上，才产生了作为社会意识的商品拜物教观念，即如马克思所说，“从这种颠倒的关系出发，……也必然产生出相应的颠倒的观念，即歪曲的意识”。这里的意之所指便包括了资产阶级经济学家们的商品拜物教观念，表明商品生产的客观物性特征在一部分人的头脑中歪曲成为了错误认识。概而言之，马克思商品拜物教批判的两重维度分别揭示了商品的客观物化特性和“商品万能”这种主观观念。由此即可证知，“商品拜物教是一种主观错认”乃是对马克思商品拜物教批判的片面认识。

Here it is particularly necessary to note that clearly distinguishing between the two dimensions—the economic base from which commodity fetishism arises and the commodity fetishism concept as an ideological superstructure—is of great significance and value, as it concerns whether one can truly understand Marx’s analysis of capitalist relations of production. As mentioned earlier, Lukács believed that Marx’s critique of commodity fetishism “implies the whole of historical materialism, the whole self-knowledge of the proletariat, that is, the knowledge of capitalist society.” [28]28 Georg Lukács, *History and Class Consciousness*, trans. Du Zhangzhi, Ren Li, and Yan Hongyuan (Beijing: The Commercial Press, 1992), p. 170. Godelier, a representative of Marxist economic anthropology, also pointed out: “Marx’s greatness lies in the fact that, through his analysis of commodities, money, capital, etc., he ‘truly reproduces’ the various facts that appear in an inverted form in people’s daily lives or in their consciousness under the capitalist mode of production, elucidating the illusory character of social relations.” [29]29 Maurice Godelier, *The Mental and the Material*, trans. Wang Yi (Beijing: SDX Joint Publishing Company, 2010), p. 180. In view of this, some domestic scholars have written: “Whether the critique of commodity fetishism is a study of social relations of production or a study of social consciousness is not a trivial dispute, but one that concerns whether we can truly understand the social relations of production of capitalist society and the specific forms and basic characteristics in which these relations manifest themselves.” [30]30 Gu Hailiang, “On the Two Dimensions of Marx’s Critique of Commodity Fetishism,” *Journal of Shanghai University of Finance and Economics*, no. 4 (2010), p. 11. If the critique of commodity fetishism is understood merely as Marx’s critique of the infatuation with and worship of commodities, this is undoubtedly a simplistic interpretation of Marx’s exposure and critique of the capitalist mode of production, and will inevitably lead to a serious weakening of the persuasiveness of Marx’s economic theory. Therefore, we must carefully analyze the two dimensions of Marx’s critique of commodity fetishism and provide a comprehensive and accurate exposition, so as to objectively highlight and embody the profound and immense explanatory power unique to Marxist economic theory.

这里需要特别注意的是，清晰区分作为商品拜物教赖以产生的经济基础和作为观念上层建筑的商品拜物教观念这两重维度，关涉到能否真正理解马克思对资本主义生产关系的剖析，因而具有重要的意义和价值。前已述及，卢卡奇认为，马克思的商品拜物教批判“隐含着全部历史唯物主义，隐含着无产阶级的全部自我认识，也就是对资本主义社会的认识”。马克思主义经济人类学代表人物戈德利尔也曾指出：“马克思之所以伟大，就在于他通过对商品、货币、资本等的分析，‘真实地再现了’在资本主义生产方式中以颠倒的形式表现在人们的日常生活中或观念上的各种事实，阐明了社会关系所带有的那种虚幻性”。有鉴于此，国内有学者撰文写道：“商品拜物教究竟是研究社会生产关系还是研究社会意识之争，不是一个枝节问题之争，而是关系到能不能真正了解资本主义的社会生产关系，能不能了解资本主义社会生产关系表现出来的具体形式和基本特征。”若仅仅将商品拜物教批判理解为马克思对商品迷恋和崇拜的批判，无疑是对马克思揭露和批判资本主义生产方式的简单解读，并必将导致马克思经济理论的说服力被严重削弱。因此，我们必须对马克思商品拜物教批判的两重维度进行认真的辨析并作出全面准确的阐述，这样才能够客观地彰显和体现马克思主义经济理论所独具的深刻而巨大的解释力。

(2) A Powerful Refutation of the “Theory of the Obsolescence of Commodity Fetishism”

(二)对“商品拜物教过时论”予以有力驳斥

Some views in academia also hold that Marx’s critique of commodity fetishism no longer has theoretical persuasiveness for the present era, and some even propose a “theory of the obsolescence of commodity fetishism,” attempting to replace Marx’s critique of commodity fetishism with a “critique of sign fetishism.” For instance, Baudrillard once said that commodity fetishism was merely the social consciousness of Marx’s own era; with the advent of consumer society and the increasingly evident guiding role of the media within it, fetishism has today transcended the economic sphere and extended to “the fetishism of objects, the fetishism of autonomy, the fetishism of sex, the fetishism of professions,” etc., into all spheres of life—issues that Marx’s political economy and philosophical theories did not address. [31]31 Jean Baudrillard, *For a Critique of the Political Economy of the Sign*, trans. Xia Ying (Nanjing: Nanjing University Press, 2009), p. 93. Baudrillard even questioned: “What can the concept of ‘commodity fetishism’ reveal, beyond revealing a ‘false consciousness’ that worships exchange value?” [31]31 Jean Baudrillard, *For a Critique of the Political Economy of the Sign*, trans. Xia Ying (Nanjing: Nanjing University Press, 2009), p. 93. In Baudrillard’s view, the use value of traditional objects has given way to their sign value, and on this basis he proposed and elaborated a “critique of sign fetishism,” arguing that contemporary fetishism has turned the privileges and differences within the entire social system into sign values, making them its own objects of worship; the worship of signs has replaced the former worship of objects. Therefore, commodity fetishism should be replaced by sign fetishism, and only by moving the critique of fetishism “from the critique of the logic of production to the critique of the logic of signs” can we “break the state where signs dominate everything.”

学界亦有观点认为，马克思的商品拜物教批判对于当今时代已不再具有理论说服力，甚至有人提出“商品拜物教过时论”，并试图以“符号拜物教批判”取代马克思的商品拜物教批判。如鲍德里亚曾经说道，商品拜物教只是马克思生活的时代的社会意识，随着消费社会的来临与媒介在消费社会中引导作用的愈益显现，时至今日拜物教已经超越了经济领域而延伸到“物的崇拜、自主性的崇拜、性崇拜、职业崇拜等”等一切生活领域，而这些是马克思的政治经济学与哲学理论中不曾涉及的问题11。鲍德里亚甚至质疑说：“对于‘商品拜物教’的概念而言，除了揭示出一种崇拜交换价值的‘错误意识’之外，还能揭示什么呢?”11在鲍德里亚看来，传统物的使用价值已让位于物的符号价值，由此他提出并阐发了“符号拜物教批判”理论，认为当代拜物教已经将整个社会体系中的特权和差异作为符号价值，变成了自己的崇拜对象，对符号的崇拜代替了过去对物的崇拜，因此商品拜物教应该为符号拜物教所取代，只有让拜物教批判“从生产逻辑批判走向符号逻辑批判”，才能“打破符号统治一切的状态”。

The revelation and exposition of the logical path of Marx’s critique of commodity fetishism is sufficient to reflect and highlight the limitations of Baudrillard’s understanding, thereby delivering a powerful blow to the “theory of the obsolescence of commodity fetishism.” It should be acknowledged that Baudrillard’s analysis of the alienated structure of consumption in modern society from the perspective of signs has its profound aspects; in a certain sense, it can indeed be said that the formation of consumer society has caused “signs” to gradually occupy an important position, with people indulging in the pleasures of the sign world and being influenced or even dominated by sign fetishism. Perhaps it is in view of this social reality that Poster writes that Baudrillard surpasses Marx in some respects, and “precisely where Marxism becomes ‘ideology’ because it cannot decipher the semiology of commodities, Baudrillard steps in, enriching and developing historical materialism to make it conform to the new situation of advanced capitalism.” [32]32 Mark Poster, ed., *Jean Baudrillard: Selected Writings*, trans. Ni Haishan (Taipei: China Times Publishing Company, 1992), p. 10. From this perspective, Baudrillard’s critique of sign fetishism seems to expand and deepen people’s understanding of “the new situation of advanced capitalism.” However, Baudrillard’s critique of capitalism only grasps the surface phenomena of capitalist production; he does not penetrate to the level of relations of production to carry out a radical critique. Specifically, Marx’s critique of commodity fetishism “penetrates through various ideologies and social phenomena to the depth of relations of production, analyzes content and form, and grasps the crux of modern society at its root through a dialectical method.” [33]33 Zhang Yibing, *Back to Marx: A Philosophical Discourse on the Economic and Philosophical Manuscripts of 1844* (Nanjing: Jiangsu People’s Publishing House, 1999), p. 4. That is to say, Marx’s critique of commodity fetishism delves into the level of relations of production, thoroughly analyzes the contradictory roots of the capitalist mode of production, and reveals the objective nature of the commodity economy—that “the relations of commodity production necessarily become reified.” Compared with Marx’s critique of relations of production, Baudrillard’s critique of capitalism does not touch upon, let alone profoundly analyze, the contradictions of the capitalist mode of production. Therefore, Baudrillard’s “theory of the obsolescence of commodity fetishism” cannot be established.

对马克思商品拜物教批判之逻辑理路的揭示和阐释，足以能够映现和彰显鲍德里亚的认识局限，从而给予“商品拜物教过时论”以有力痛击。应当承认，鲍德里亚基于符号视角对现代社会消费异化结构所作的剖析有其深刻之处，从一定意义上的确可以说，消费社会的形成使得“符号”逐渐占据重要地位，人们沉溺于符号世界的享乐中，受到符号拜物教的影响乃至支配。或许正是鉴于这样一种社会现实，波斯特写道，鲍德里亚有其超越马克思之处，而“就在马克思主义因为不能译解商品符号学而变成‘意识形态’之处，鲍德里亚进来了，他丰富并发展了历史唯物主义，使它符合发达资本主义的新形势”。从这一视角看，鲍德里亚对符号拜物教的批判似乎拓展和深化了人们对“发达资本主义的新形势”的认识。但是鲍德里亚的资本主义批判抓住的仅仅是资本主义生产的表象，他并没有深入到生产关系层面进行釜底抽薪式的批判。具体说来，马克思的商品拜物教批判“穿透了种种意识形态和社会现象、进到生产关系的深度，分析了内容与形式，以辩证的方法在根源处把握住了现代社会的症结”，即是说，马克思的商品拜物教批判深入到了生产关系层面，透彻地剖析了资本主义社会生产方式的矛盾根源，揭示了商品经济所具有的“商品生产关系必然物化”的客观性质。相较于马克思的生产关系批判，鲍德里亚的资本主义批判并未触及、当然更遑论深刻剖析资本主义社会生产方式的矛盾。因此，鲍德里亚的“商品拜物教过时论”并不能成立。

In summary, from the perspective of Marx’s critique of the economic base on which commodity fetishism depends, as long as commodity relations of production still exist, Marx’s theory of the critique of commodity fetishism will still possess the theoretical persuasiveness to gain insight into and critique the era, and it will not become obsolete.

归结起来，从马克思对商品拜物教赖以存在的经济基础的批判来看，只要商品生产关系还存在，马克思的商品拜物教批判理论就仍然具有洞察时代和批判时代的理论说服力，就仍然不会过时。

(3) Inspiring People to Establish a Dialectical View of Commodities and Consciously Break Down the Barriers of Commodity Fetishism from Within Its Own Reified Structure

(三)启发人们树立辩证商品观，自觉从商品物化结构内部打破其自身藩篱

An in-depth exploration and exposition of the logical path of Marx’s critique of commodity fetishism helps to inspire people to establish a dialectical view of commodities, consciously promote the development of productive forces, and thereby break down the barriers of commodity fetishism from within its own reified structure, ultimately achieving the elimination of commodities and commodity fetishism.

对马克思商品拜物教批判逻辑理路进行深入探析和阐发，有助于启发人们树立辩证商品观，自觉推动生产力发展，从而基于商品内部的物化结构打破其自身藩篱，最终实现消灭商品及商品拜物教。

On the one hand, we must correctly understand the objective necessity of the emergence of commodities and affirm their role in promoting the development of productive forces. The preceding analysis of the logical path of Marx’s critique of commodity fetishism shows that commodities are essentially the inevitable product of objective social relations at a certain historical stage, emerging with the historical development of the mode of labor. Hence, the emergence of commodities has objective necessity. Consequently, any attempt to artificially eliminate the commodity economy is a violation of objective historical development. Therefore, we must clearly acknowledge and actively utilize commodities and commodity production, vigorously developing the commodity economy to promote the improvement of productive forces. On the other hand, we must also recognize the historical transience of the emergence and existence of commodities and actively create conditions for their elimination. From the preceding investigation and analysis of Marx’s critique of commodity fetishism, it can also be seen that commodities, as products of the mode of production at a certain historical stage, will ultimately disappear with the development of the mode of production. Therefore, we must have a clear understanding of the historical transience of commodities, understanding that whether commodities and commodity fetishism disappear depends fundamentally on the level of development of the mode of production. This requires that in practice we consciously use commodities as a means to develop productive forces and promote the transformation of the mode of production, thereby breaking down the barriers of commodity fetishism from within its own reified structure, ultimately leading to the disappearance of commodities and commodity fetishism.

一方面，我们必须正确认识商品产生的客观必然性，肯定其对生产力发展的促进作用。前文对马克思商品拜物教批判的逻辑理路的分析表明，商品本质上是一定历史阶段客观社会关系的必然产物，随着劳动方式的历史发展而出现，因而商品的产生具有客观必然性，由此，任何试图人为消灭商品经济的做法都是对客观历史发展的违背，所以我们必须对商品和商品生产予以明确承认和积极利用，大力发展商品经济，以促进生产力的提高。另一方面，我们也要看到商品产生和存在的历史暂时性，并为消灭商品积极创造条件。从前文对马克思商品拜物教批判的考察分析中同样可以看到，商品作为一定历史阶段生产方式的产物，也终将随着生产方式的发展而消失，因此，我们务必要对商品的历史暂时性有一种清醒的认识，理解商品及商品拜物教消失与否从根本上说取决于生产方式的发展水平。这就需要在实践中自觉以商品为手段来发展生产力、促进生产方式的变革，进而从商品物化结构内部打破其自身藩篱，最终使商品及商品拜物教归于消失。

In summary, the critique of commodity fetishism is an important achievement of Marx’s critique of political economy, and it is a significant theoretical weapon and ideological guide that cannot be overlooked in understanding Marx’s critique of political economy. In its essence, it is Marx’s analysis and critique, from the standpoint of historical materialism, of the reified nature of capitalist relations of production. Marx not only explained that “capital is not a thing, but a social relation between persons mediated through things,” but further elaborated the reasons why this relation in capitalist society necessarily appears in a distorted and inverted form. In other words, wherever the natural attributes of “things” seem to be manifested, Marx profoundly reveals the social relations of intercourse and relations of production behind the “things,” thereby explaining the reasons and mechanisms by which social relations between people are necessarily distortedly expressed as relations between things and ultimately lead to the worship of “things.” Thus, Marx achieved a thoroughgoing critique of the capitalist mode of production, one that removes its very foundation.

综上所述，商品拜物教批判是马克思政治经济学批判的一项重要成果，是理解马克思政治经济学批判所不可忽视的重要理论武器和思想指南。就其本质而言，它是马克思站在历史唯物主义的高度，对资本主义生产关系的物化性质所作的分析与批判。马克思不仅说明了“资本不是一种物，而是一种以物为中介的人和人之间的社会关系”，而且进一步阐述了这一关系在资本主义社会何以必然地会以歪曲、颠倒的形式反映出来的根由所在。质言之，在看似体现“物”的自然属性的地方，马克思都深刻地揭示了“物”背后的社会交往关系和生产关系，从而说明人与人的社会关系必然歪曲地表现为物与物的关系并最终导致对“物”的崇拜的原因及其发生机制。由此，马克思实现了对资本主义生产方式的釜底抽薪式的全面批判。

Online editor: Paul

网络编辑：保罗