Means of production - wikipedia Means of production This article is about the economics term. For the compilation album by British musician Aim, see Means of Production. For other uses, see Means of production ( disambiguation ). Economics A supply and demand diagram, illustrating the effects of an increase in demand. Index Outline History Types Classification History of economics Economic history ( academic study ) Schools of economics Microeconomics Macroeconomics Methodology Heterodox economics JEL classification codes Concepts Theory Techniques Econometrics Economic growth Economic system Experimental economics Mathematical economics Game theory Post-scarcity Market National accounting By application Agricultural Behavioral Business Computational Cultural Demographic Development Digitization Ecological Education Environmental Evolutionary Expeditionary Geography Health Industrial organization Information International Knowledge Labour Law Managerial Monetary / Financial Natural resource Organizational Personnel Public / Welfare economics Regional Rural Service Social Urban Welfare Lists Economists Publications ( journals ) Business and economics portal In economics and sociology, the means of production are physical, non-human inputs used for the production of economic value, such as facilities, machinery, tools, infrastructural capital and natural capital. The means of production includes two broad categories of objects : instruments of labor ( tools, factories, infrastructure, etc. ) and subjects of labor ( natural resources and raw materials ). If creating a good, people operate on the subjects of labor, using the instruments of labor, to create a product ; or, stated another way, labour acting on the means of production creates a good. In an agrarian society the means of production is the soil and the shovel. In an industrial society it is the mines and the factories, and in a knowledge economy, the computers and networks. In a broad sense, the `` means of production '' also includes the `` means of distribution '' such as stores, the internet ( but not free peer - to - peer meshnet ), railroads, phone lines. The ownership of the social means of production is a key factor in categorizing different economic systems. In the terminology of classical economics, the means of production are the `` factors of production '' minus financial capital and minus human capital. Contents 1 Related terms 2 Marxian economic analysis 3 See also 4 Footnotes 5 References Related terms Factors of production are defined by German economist Karl Marx in his book Das Kapital as labour, subjects of labor, and instruments of labor : the term is equivalent to means of production plus labor. The factors of production are often listed in economic writings derived from the classical school as `` land, labour and capital ''. Marx sometimes used the term `` productive forces '' equivalently with `` factors of production ; '' in Kapital, he uses `` factors of production '', in his famous Preface to the Critique of Political Economy, he uses `` productive forces '' ( that may depend on the translation ). Production relations ( German : Produktionsverhältnis ) are the relations humans enter into with each other in using the means of production to produce. Examples of such relations are employer / employee, buyer / seller, the technical division of labour in a factory, and property relations. Mode of production ( German : Produktionsweise ) means the dominant way in which production is organised in society. For instance, `` capitalism '' is the name for the capitalist mode of production in which the means of production are owned privately by a small class ( the bourgeoisie ) who profits off the labour of the working class ( the proletariat ). Communism is a mode of production in which the means of production are not owned by anyone, but shared in common, without class based exploitation. Marxian economic analysis Part of a series on Marxian economics Concepts Capital ( accumulation ) Capitalist mode of production Class process Commodity ( production ) Concrete and abstract labor Constant capital Exchange value Exploitation Labour power Labour theory of value Law of accumulation Law of value Means of production Mode of production Monopoly capitalism Organic composition of capital Productive forces Profit Prices of production Primitive accumulation Rate of exploitation Rate of profit Real prices and ideal prices Relations of production Reproduction Reserve army of labour Socially necessary labour time Socialist mode of production Socialization Simple commodity production Surplus value Surplus labour Surplus product Use value Wage labour Wage slavery Value - form Value product Variable capital Topics Capital controversy Crisis theory Economic determinism Immiseration thesis Historical materialism Okishio 's theorem Overaccumulation Overdetermination Overproduction Kondratiev wave Technological determinism Technological unemployment Temporal single - system interpretation Falling profit - rate tendency Transformation problem Underconsumption Value Variants Analytical Marxism Classical Marxism Orthodox Marxism Overaccumulation Neo-Marxian economics Underconsumptionism Works A Contribution to the Critique of Political Economy Das Kapital Grundrisse Economic and Philosophical Manuscripts of 1844 The Accumulation of Capital Monopoly Capital The Theory of Capitalist Development Finance Capital People Karl Marx Friedrich Engels Vladimir Lenin Rosa Luxemburg Rudolf Hilferding Leon Trotsky Karl Kautsky Ernest Mandel Antonie Pannekoek János Kornai Andrew Kliman Richard D. Wolff Nikolai Kondratiev Paul Sweezy Nobuo Okishio Ian Steedman John Roemer David Laibman Paul A. Baran Stephen Resnick Michał Kalecki Journals Cambridge Journal of Economics International Journal of Political Economy Monthly Review New School Economic Review real - world economics review Rethinking Marxism Science and Society Related topics Evolutionary economics Classical economics Marxism Marxist sociology Neoclassical economics Perspectives on capitalism Political economy Schools of economic thought Socialist economics Critiques of capitalism Economics portal Marxism portal The analysis of the ownership and control of the means of production, as well as the level of their technological sophistication, is a central component of Marxist theory. In Marxist theory, the process of socioeconomic change and evolution is based on the premise of technological improvements in the means of production. As the level of technology improves, existing forms of social relations become inconsistent and unnecessary, creating contradictions between the level of technology in the means of production, and the organization of society and its economy in particular. These contradictions manifest themselves in the form of class conflicts, which develop to a point where the existing mode of production becomes unsustainable, either collapsing or being overthrown in a social revolution, leading to the emergence of a new mode of production based on a different set of social relations, most notably, a different form of ownership for the means of production. Ownership of the means of production and control over the surplus product generated by their operation is the fundamental factor in delineating different economic systems ( or modes of production ). Capitalism is defined as private ownership and control over the means of production, where the surplus product becomes a source of unearned income for its owners. By contrast, socialism is defined as social ownership of the means of production so that the surplus product accrues to society at large. To the question of why classes exist in human societies in the first place, Karl Marx offered a historical and scientific explanation that it was the cultural practice of ownership of the means of production that gives rise to them. This explanation differs dramatically from other explanations based on `` differences in ability '' between individuals or on religious or political affiliations giving rise to castes. This explanation is consistent with the bulk of Marxist theory in which Politics and Religion are seen as mere outgrowths ( superstructures ) of the basic underlying economic reality of a people. See also Wikiquote has quotations related to : Means of production Capital ( economics ) Clause IV Distributism Factors of production Information revolution Gross fixed capital formation Mode of production Nationalization Productive forces Property Private property Privatization Relations of production Socialization ( economics ) Footnotes Jump up ^ James M. Henslin ( 2002 ). Essentials of Sociology. Taylor & Francis US. p. 159. Jump up ^ Michael Evans, Karl Marx, London, England, 1975. Part II, Chap. 2, sect. a ; p. 63. Jump up ^ Flower, B.O. The Arena, Volume 37. The Arena Pub. Co, originally from Princeton University. p. 9 Jump up ^ Mode of Production. Marxism.org Jump up ^ Frederick Engels : Socialism : Utopian and Scientific Chapter III Historical Materialism Marx2mao.com. p. 74 References Institute of Economics of the Academy of Sciences of the U.S.S.R. ( 1957 ). Political Economy : A Textbook. London : Lawrence and Wishart. Marxist phraseology and terminology Philosophy and politics ( Marxist ) Barracks communism Base and superstructure Bourgeoisie Bourgeois democracy Bourgeois nationalism Bourgeois socialism Capitalist mode of production Class struggle Commodification Dialectics Socialist mode of production Pure communism Dictatorship of the proletariat Imperialism Liquidationism Lumpenproletariat Means of labor Metabolic rift Petite bourgeoisie Primitive accumulation of capital Proletarian internationalism Proletarian revolution Revolutionary spontaneity Revolutionary wave Scientific socialism Super-imperialism Historical materialism Theoretician Two Stage Theory Wage slavery Workers Council Workers Control World revolution Economics and sociology ( Marxian ) Capital Accumulation of capital Capitalist mode of production Crisis of capitalism Commodity Commodity production Dominant ideology Free association Materialism Means of production Mode of production Productive forces Relations of production Worker Cooperative Law of value Surplus value Use - value Exchange value Value Socially necessary labour time Socialization Production for use Socialist mode of production Ruling class Simple commodity production Commanding heights of the economy Marxist - Leninist Cadre Central Committee Democratic centralism Dual power Enemy of the people Foco General line of the party National liberation New class Politburo Political rehabilitation Popular front Revolutionary terror United front Vanguardism Social fascism Socialist accumulation Real socialism Revisionism Soviet democracy Socialism in one country Social imperialism People 's democracy Trotskyist Deformed workers ' state Degenerated workers ' state Social revolution New class Permanent revolution Bureaucratic collectivism Maoist Marxism -- Leninism -- Maoism Antagonistic contradiction One Divides Into Two Capitalist roader Four Olds Mass line New Democracy People 's war Revolutionary base area Struggle session Retrieved from `` https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Means_of_production&oldid=806990354 '' Categories : Marxist terminology Socialism Capitalism Marxian economics Production economics Labour economics Capital ( economics ) Factors of production Talk Variants Contents About Wikipedia Wikiquote Aragonés Беларуская Български Català Čeština Dansk Deutsch Español Esperanto Euskara فارسی Français 한국어 हिन्दी Bahasa Indonesia Italiano עברית Қазақша Kurdî Latina Magyar Nederlands 日本 語 Norsk Oʻzbekcha / ўзбекча Polski Português Русский Simple English Slovenčina Svenska Türkçe Українська Tiếng Việt 中文 Edit links This page was last edited on 25 October 2017, at 07 : 57. 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Question: who owns the means of production under capitalism
Answer: privately by a small class (the bourgeoisie) who profits off the labour of the working class (the proletariat)