PUB - Publikationen an der Universität Bielefeld

This article analyzes the role of free wage labor in Karl Marx's and Max Weber's theories of capitalism. Both view free wage labor as constitutive for capitalism, since, in Marx's words, there is no capital without a worker in full command of his labor power. Weber believed that it was more the fear of losing his or her only available source of income that motivated the worker to expend his or her labor power. Nevertheless, it took a long time for free wage labor contracts to become the norm, and they were met with widespread resistance from employers, at least in Western Europe and the United States. Meanwhile unfree labor lived on as an anachronism in the global and industrial periphery, and different forms of bonded labor were revitalized on a broad basis around the globe. Still, the article concludes that the systematic position of free wage labor in capitalism should not be downplayed.