Thank you Louis. I wish others would be less quick to throw in the towel. If your gut tells you the imperialist nations got and are getting something from the Third World, maybe we need to apply some mental energy to pinpointing it. Louis speaks of the Rodney portion of the Williams-Rodney thesis. The Williams part is named for Eric Williams (_Capitalism and Slavery_), who concentrated on what the industrializing nations got, while the Rodney portion concentrates on the negative impact on Africa. For a more recent exposition of the Williams-Rodney thesis, see Darity's work, e.g., William Darity, Jr., "A Model of 'Original Sin': Rise of the West and Lag of the Rest," _American Economic Review_, Vol. 82, No. 2, pp. 162-67, May, 1992; William Darity, Jr., "Mercantilism, Slavery, and the Industrial Revolution," _Research in Political Economy_, Vol. 5, pp. 1-21, 1982; William Darity, Jr., "British Industry and the West Indies Plantations," in J. E. Inikori and S. L. Engerman (eds.): _The Atlantic Slave Trade_, Duke U. Press, 1992. Obviously, in the world we live in, it takes a lot more work to make the argument like the Williams-Rodney thesis than to argue that "well, the industrialized countries really didn't get that much out of it" or "capitalism was really good for Africa" etc. Unbelievable. Come on, "progressive economists"! I'd love to sponsor a debate between Darity and Brad, or between Darity and Wojtek for that matter. (Although we could use Wojtek's framework and just add in tons of what he is calling "externalities" and come up with a different bottom line.) Come on, Marxists, let's start with "Primitive Accumulation" and we'll take it from there. And reserve army for sure. But some of the horrors, theft, rape, plunder, slavery, murder, doesn't come up in the "percentages" (although Darity takes on the "small ratios" theory, in the last cite above, I believe.) By the way, how much pressure did Tanzania get over Ujamaa? mf -----Original Message----- From: Louis Proyect <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> To: [EMAIL PROTECTED] <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> Date: Tuesday, September 14, 1999 2:39 PM Subject: [PEN-L:10968] Why China Failed to Become Capitalist >There are no statutes of limitation on imperialism. Just because US >multinationals are ignoring most of Subsaharan Africa today, we can not >forgive or forget that the damage was already done. Walter Rodney's "How >Europe Underdeveloped Africa" leaves no doubt that imperialism left the >continent in a shattered state. The absence of foreign investment today is >not so much a sign of "benign neglect", but rather that the bones have been >already been picked clean. Colin Leys, on the Socialist Register editorial >board, has written an analysis of underdevelopment in Africa that >elaborates on these points. Titled "Rise and Fall of Development Theory", >it attempts to skirt the dialectical poles of the sort of stagist Marxism >represented by James Heartfield and the late Bill Zimmer, both of whom >argue that more foreign investment was needed in Africa if anything, and >"dependency theorists" on the other who blame everything on capitalist >penetration. Leys's basic argument is that Africa is suspended between 2 >modes of production. It has not fully uprooted precapitalist social and >economic formations, but at the same time it has not been attractive enough >to outside capitalist investors to warrant the full-scale transformation >that has taken place in much of East Asia, for example. > > > >Louis Proyect > >(http://www.panix.com/~lnp3/marxism.html) >
