Law and capitalist mode of production: on the structural role of ideology

Abstract

I discuss here the ideological role of law in the capitalist mode of production. Considering the “antediluvian” existence of law, its role in capitalism is qualitatively different from what occurs in pre-capitalist societies – generically referred to as “tributary mode of production” – insofar as, from the bourgeois revolution onwards, the commodity law form rises to the condition that I call the “fundamental ideology” of society, directly linked to and necessary reflection of its material base. This is due to the link between the law form and the commodity form, discovered by Pashukanis.