Ricardo: >peasant in the rise of capitalism. His early book, The Development of >Capitalism in Russia, written while in exile in >Siberia, still surpasses much of what has been said since. Here I >want to refer to another excellent work the 23 year Lenin wrote, >On The So-Called Market, where he directly poses the question: "Can >capitalism develop in Russia and reach full development when the >masses of the people are poor and are becoming still poorer?" - to >which he answered "yes". I am not sure how this fits into the series of articles on ReOrient, but I would disagree with Lenin's prediction that capitalism would develop in Russia, if by this he means capitalism of the sort characteristic of Western Europe. What was blocking full-scale capitalist development in Russia was imperialist domination. If Lenin was referring to capitalism in the countryside, there is evidence to support this view. However, industrial production was primarily at the mercy of foreign investors. "The confluence of industrial with bank capital was also accomplished in Russia with a completeness you might not find in any other country. But the subjection of the industries to the banks meant, for the same reasons, their subjection to the western European money market. Heavy industry (metal, coal, oil) was almost wholly under the control of foreign finance capital, which had created for itself an auxiliary and intermediate system of banks in Russia. Light industry was following the same road. Foreigners owned in general about 40 per cent of all the stock capital of Russia, but in the leading branches of industry that percentage was still higher. We can say without exaggeration that the controlling shares of stock in the Russian banks, plants and factories were to be found abroad, the amount held in England, France and Belgium being almost double that in Germany." (Trotsky, History of the Russian Revolution) Louis Proyect (http://www.panix.com/~lnp3/marxism.html)
