Abstract

Marx's economic theory provides us with the theoretical tool of analyzing capitalist mode of production and economic system. But this theoretical tool also has a critical prerequisite，i.e.，the critique of the economic reality and history of ideas in which Marx's doctrine is embedded. It is only possible to establish an appropriate understanding of the capitalist mode of production if various ideological categories and practical functions of bourgeois economic theories are removed. Therefore，Marx's economic theory is not only a theory that can objectively analyze the reality of capitalist economy but also a discourse that surpasses and criticizes the historical background of bourgeois economic theories. We believe that the latter aspect is exactly the logical foundation of the former. Specifically，such surpassing and critique are composed of two co-related aspects. First，it is the critique of bourgeois economic categories. Although Marx inherited many economic categories from various theories before him，especially from classic political economy，these categories were first produced in a certain capitalist economic reality. These objectively-existing categories are circulated in economic reality，participating in the production and preservation of capitalist economy. In terms of content，they do not directly apprehend capitalist mode of production. Yet due to their objective practical significance，they constitute the starting point for the theoretical comprehension of capitalist economic reality. And Marx's economic theory does start from the critique of these common-sensual or theoretical economic categories. Secondly，bourgeois economic theories as ‘objective forms of thought’ are engaged in capitalist economic reality per se and possess certain practical functions. Bourgeois economics theories do not themselves apprehend their own functions. But these functions constitute the historical particularities of these theoretical discourses. Their critique of the Marxian thesis is first of all the result of the conflicts between different practical functions of theoretical discourses. For instance，when neoclassical economics possesses certain functions of subjectivity production，a type of de-subjectified economic theory seems to the former to be unacceptable. In order to get rid of the function of subjectivity production，Marx's theory must adopt de-subjectified theoretical language. Its structured description of the capitalist mode of production is also the result of the critique and rejection of the subjectivity production function in economic theories. In general，the dual critique of economic categories and subjectivity production function in economic discourses constitutes the basic solution in Marx's economic theory dealing with its own background in the history of economic thoughts.

Key Words： Marxian economic theory；Labour theory of value；history of western economic thoughts；classic political economy；neoclassical economics；subject production