O Capital de Marx : do fetichismo da mercadoria-dinheiro ao fetichismo do capital portador de juros

Abstract

Studies on fetishism in Marx have been the subject of intense debate, starting with the breadth that the concept assumes within philosophical thought. This thesis proposes to carry out an analysis of the category of fetishism as outlined by Marx in his work “Das Kapital”. The central objective is to expose the three primordial forms of fetishism present in Book I and the fourth form of fetishism contained in interest-bearing capital in Book III. Fetishism, in this context, means that relationships between people appear as relationships between objects, hiding the social characteristics of production relations by attributing them qualities inherent to objects. To clarify the problem, an examination of the fetishism associated with commodities, money and capital was established, supporting the idea that the fetishism of interest-bearing capital (DD') in Book III is the maximum expression of the fetishization of commercial social relations. In this form, the totality of social relations is reduced to a dynamic in which money in the form of capital (D-D') relates to itself, reflecting an extreme stage of fetishization of social relations. The thesis, therefore, concludes that Marx's theory of fetishism can be understood as the general theory of production relations in the capitalist mercantile economy.