Charles Brown wrote: > > > > CB: Ok , how about just "profits" ? Why would U.S. imperialism and U.S. > based transnationals go through so much, invest so much in creating and > protecting capitalist relations of production outside of U.S. territory if > profits were not made there ?
Profits are the _ultimate_ goal but never necessarily the immediate goal of capitalist action (particularly of the capitalist state, which among other things is the domain of intra-capitalist struggle). In any case, I can't answer your question with any certainty, but there are several obvious possible motives, none of which directly concern profits: 1. Insure against the rise of serious capitalist enemies. 2. Maintain control of natural resources. 3. Provide investment opportunity (even if at close to zero profits) for capital that can not other wise be invested at all. And so forth. But I think both you and Lou are too focused on demonstrating that capitalists are bad. That goes without saying. What needs to be demonstrated, always, is that capital cannot NOT do as it does. That was Lenin's point, against Kautsky who saw imperialism as an optional policy. And profits in any given context are an option, not a necessity. And if you review the various debates on lbo, marxism, & pen-l over the years you will also see that whenever a debate was grounded in merely empirical claims (a poll was or wasn't accurate, an economic statistic was or wasn't accurate, etc) the debate has simply gone nowhere. Carrol
