Vol. 55 No. 218 (2025): Surplus Society – »Superfluous« in Contemporary Capitalism

In this issue, we address the issue of how capitalist economies not only accumulate vast amounts of wealth, surplus value and material surplus, but also continually produce »surplus populations« with regard to the capitalist demand for labour. Capitalist societies are therefore »surplus societies« in two respects, in which the accumulation of material and value wealth corresponds to the release and impoverishment of sections of the population deemed to be »surplus«. We want to draw attention to this dual meaning of ‘surplus’ in capitalism with the title »Surplus Society«. We use terms such as »superfluous«, »surplus populations«, »surplus populations« or »relative overpopulation« as critical terms, following what Marx calls the »general law of capitalist accumulation«. In the various articles in this issue, it becomes clear several times that those who appear to be »superfluous« from the narrow perspective of capital fulfil central social functions from a societal perspective and are of indispensable importance for social reproduction.

With contributions from Laura Boemke, Marie-Sophie Borchelt Camêlo, Jakob Graf, Tine Haubner, Stefanie Hürtgen, Johanna Neuhauser, Mike Laufenberg, Margit Mayer, Anil Shah, Christoph Scherrer, Dorothea Schmidt and Jan Weckwerth.