Hey good start ;;;;As to these issues one may say: 1)It may be said that the closer workers are brought together via improved means of communications, and literally a smaller world, the bigger the springboard for cooperation in an ever bigger proletariat. Also The development of machinery through integrating movable and static energy parts dictated by the drive to produce, implies at one extreme a fusion of artificial with human intelligence. this may not make a commodity produce a commodity, but where technology is higher, the relative surplus value might reach new heights. A cybernetic highly socialized worker is happening in the west while horse carts are the trade mark of the east. the rift is too great, so is the wage, and working classes in the west attach their immediate interests to the miserization of the poor in the east. nationalism, which as Balibar said is always tainted with racism rises to the fore, ever serving the interests of capital.
2)that never ceded it is just detente with a deterrent. well it may be argued that it is the overwhelming first strike capacity of the USA that deals that one in. some argued convincingly that the collapse of the USSR was nothing less than losing the capacity to effectively deter against an American first strike. 3) Edward Schaffer's "Oil and imperialism" sometimes in the fifties talks about this thesis. things can get worst. this leaves the shape of resistance since western left was unable bridge the working class divide. now that workers' pensions and savings are part and parcel of capital they too get fight capital's battle under nationalism. the real qualitative difference is in steeper world working class divisions where the toil of one class is the booty of another. let us not forget that on the human side it is far worst now than any other time and the richer working classes do not budge as always when blood is spilled in the colonies. and upon closer examination the now in vogue suicide attackers cannot be explained outside of this social context. > CB: Here's my proposal for defining a qualitatively > new phase of imperialism: > > 1) The scientific and technological revolution > especially in transportation and communication > "machinery" has resulted in Marx's "cooperation" > turning into its opposite, being overcome by > machinery. The capitalist do not have to group large > numbers of workers in large factories to maximize > the extraction of relative surplus value( See Marx's > discussion of relative surplus value and the factory > system in _Capital_ I). This technological > development allowed the capitalists to > geographically and territorially scatter the points > of production., undermining the classic Leninist > factory scenario , the workers' direct sensing of > their strength in numbers , working class ghettos > > 2) The military interimperialist rivalry, world wars > between imperialists of Lenin's day has been turned > into its opposite , a relative military unity and > alliance due to the imperialist response to the > Soviet Union, and other socialist and nationally > liberated countries, i.e. the imperialist hot and > cold wars against them. AND the collapse of the > Soviet center of that system. > > 3) The Mark Jones thesis of crisis in production of > the strategic resource, oil. > > __________________________________________________ Do You Yahoo!? Check out Yahoo! Shopping and Yahoo! Auctions for all of your unique holiday gifts! Buy at http://shopping.yahoo.com or bid at http://auctions.yahoo.com
