>>> [EMAIL PROTECTED] 07/19/01 08:18PM >>>
neither. It says that Lenin felt and said that Bukharin's book was more
complete and accurate than his own little pamphlet on the subject.
Bukharin's analysis doesn't fit today's imperialism very well at all, since
his emphasis was on the aggressive competition amongst the rich capitalist
nation-states (national capitals). These days, it's more a matter of the
center vs. the periphery (e.g., NATO vs. Serbia).
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CB: But I assume Bukharin discusses the other dimensions of imperialism. Aggressive
competition amongst the rich capitalist nation-states is only one aspect of the
defining characteristics that Lenin points to. In a way, monopoly, state-monopoly,
finance capital, financial oligarchy and export of capital are the more "economic"
aspects of the definition, and these aspects are those that persist today and are
thereby more pertinent today's discussions.
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>CB: Yes, I agree. I often say way have a sort of Kautskyian
>superimperialism today.
>
>Because the Soviet Union came about after Lenin's analysis of imperialism
>( and because in large part because of the Leninists political work) , to
>make a long story short, the imperialist nations of the 1914 period, have
>had to unite against the SU and socialist countries, ending the
>interimperialist rivalry dimension of Lenin's definition of imperialism in
>the 1914 period. There has also been a world wide revolution against the
>colonial system of the 1914 period. With the fall of the SU, this
>interimperialist _unity_ has not dissolved ( yet), so we have
>, dialectically, especially through the mechanism of the Soviet Union and
>imperialist reaction to it, Kautskyian ultraimperialism or superimperialism.
I'm not sure that there's much basis at this point for the revival of the
kind of inter-state rivalry within the capitalist center that Bukharin saw.
Maybe if we see a severe depression or if the kind of social collapse that
Tom Walkers says might happen...
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CB: Yes, I was not trying to imply that we are about to go back to world wars,
although I wouldn't totally count it out forever. We have Pax (Pox) Americana.
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>But the other dimensions of the imperialism of the 1914 period have not
>gone away. In other words, it is still appropriate to refer to capitalism
>today as imperialism.
this is a big argument, but I agree in the end that what we see nowadays is
a kind of imperialism.
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CB: Surely we have an empire. It is more like the old time empires than was the
imperialism of multiple centers from the early 1900's. It is more like the Roman
empire which had a single hegmon.
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>Or are you saying that the G-7 countries ( today's "imperialist powers" )
>don't export capital as a main process ?
instead of "export of capital," I see imperialism as involving the
generalization of commodity production (and what Braverman called the
"Universal Market") and of the proletarianization of labor, i.e., an export
of capitalism. Because of the dominance of the center (over the periphery)
in this process, there has also been a redistribution of surplus-value
toward the center.
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CB: Well, yes, I interpret "export of capital" to mean export of capitalist relations
of production to the colonies of the empire, export of capitalism to the periphery or
colonies or neo-colonies.
Agree on the redistribution of surplus-value to the "center" or the empirial centers.
So, the export of capitalism, does not mean making fulfledged capitalists of
individuals who are native to the colonies. The American capitalists are the
capitalist owning the capital in its colonies.
At any rate, this export of capitalism is what Lenin means by export of capital and is
a central dimension of imperialism that persists in 2001.
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>In the above, are you saying that export of capital does not accurately
>characterize the U.S. big corporations today ? How can that be ? What's
>globalization if not export of capital all over the world by the U.S. and
>other G-7 countries' corporations ?
these days, the US mostly imports capital, as I said before.
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CB: To say that the U.S. net imports capital does not contradict the fact that the
U.S. exports a lot of capital in the sense of establishing capitalist relations of
production in many neo-colonies. For example, the maquiladora plants in Mexico are
exported U.S. capital , aren't they ? What are U.S. based transnational but companies
that export capital ? I don't see how globalization is the U.S. importing capital. The
impact of NAFTA is to allow the U.S. to export capital or capitalism as you say.
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>Are you saying that today's big capitalist countries are not characterized
>by the dominance of finance capital and financial oligarchy?
The industrial capitalists are important too. There's a shifting coalition
of financial and industrial capitalists in power.
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CB: I'm not sure what Bukharin says, but by "finance capital" Lenin specifically means
the merger of financial and industrial capital. Does Bukharin disagree on that ?
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>...Are you really saying that monopoly is not an accurate description of
>the U.S. economy 2001 ?
yes.
>If so, that would seem to defy their surface appearance. Microsoft is in
>court right now , accused of being a monopoly even by the bourgeois legal
>system.
Microsoft is more of an exception than the rule. BTW, I'd also point to the
drug companies as monopolies.
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CB: How about the Fortune 500 ? They seem to rule , and not exceptionally
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>Are you saying GM, Ford, Daimler, Toyota etc. are not monopolies ?
No they aren't, since they compete with each other.
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CB: So you are making the point that they are oligopolies ?
Did the big companies that Bukharin analyzed compete with each other ? Wouldn't you
say that by "monopoly" Bukharin and Lenin meant "oligopoly" ? Clearly.
The point is what Bukharin and Lenin described for early 1900 , oligopoly ( and which
was termed "monopoly") persists. Certainly in the pamphlet _Imperialism_ , Lenin
doesn't describe one company dominating every industry, so the pattern of a few
companies dominating that he describes persists today, even if "monopoly" is the wrong
term.
>The oil companies, seven sisters. The vast majority of the Fortune 500 ? I
>don't get it. ( But you say more below on monopoly )
I use the economic definition of monopoly.
I have to go now...
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CB: Ignoring the label for a minute, doesn't the pattern of the dominance of a few big
companies described by Lenin and presumably Bukharin persist today ?
