Law of Accumulation and Breakdown of the Capitalist System

Henryk Grossman (1881-1950) was born in Cracow and studied law and economics in Cracow and Vienna. In 1925 he joined the Institute of Social Research in Frankfurt. He left Germany in the 1930s and returned to become Professor of Political Economy at Leipzig University in 1949.

'One of the seminal works of Marxian political economy'

• Foreword by Tony KennedyHenryk Grossmann and the Theory of Capitalist CollapseTony KennedyIntroduction by Henryk Grossmann1. The Downfall of Capitalism in the Existing LiteratureThe point at issueThe conception of breakdown in the existing literatureHow Kautsky finally abandoned Marx’s theory of accumulation and of breakdownNotes2. The Law of Capitalist BreakdownIs there a theory of breakdown in Marx?Preliminary methodological remarksThe equilibrium theory of the neo-harmonistsThe conditions and tasks of schematic analysisWhy was classical economy alarmed by the fall in the rate of Profit despite an expanding mass of profit?The views of classical economists on the future of capitalismThe Marxist theory of accumulation and breakdownMarx’s theory of breakdown is also a theory of crisesAn anti-critical interludeThe logical and mathematical basis of the law of breakdownWhy the Marxist theory of accumulation and breakdown was misunderstoodThe factors of the breakdown and the business cycleCrises and the theory of underconsumptionThe elasticity of accumulationThe restricted development of productive forces under CapitalismThe Marxist theory of imperfect valorisationNotes3. Modifying CountertendenciesIntroductionPart 1: Countertendencies Internal to the Mechanism of CapitalIncreases in the rate of profit through the expansion of productivityReducing the costs of variable capital through increases in productivityShortening the turnover time and its impact on the rate of surplus valueThe additional money capital required for an expanded scale of productionThe conflict between use value and exchange valueThe emergence of new spheres of production with a lower Organic composition of capitalThe struggle to abolish groundrentThe struggle to eliminate the commercial profitThe economic function of ‘third persons’Expanding the scale of production on the existing technological basis: simple accumulationThe periodic devaluation of capital on the accumulation processThe expansion of share capitalThe accumulation of capital and the problem of populationPart 2: Restoring Profitability through World Market DominationIntroduction: The economic function of imperialismThe function of foreign trade under capitalismForeign trade and world monopoliesThe function of capital exports under capitalismNotesBibliographyIndex