Socialist Party Australia - What is Imperialism?

sp writes "Article from Matt Wilson, Melbourne Northern suburbs branch of the SP, on What is Imperialism?

What is Imperialism?
By Matt Wilson, written just after US victory in war on Iraq

The speedy overthrow of the Saddam Hussainís regime has resulted in a wave
of propaganda emanating from the leaders of the coalition forces. Bush,
Blair and Howard are now basking in the supposed vindication of their
aggressive policies towards Iraq. At the same time, the peace movement has
seen a marked decline in numbers. Since at this stage, no weapons of mass
destruction have been found in Iraq it would be ludicrous to attribute this
decline to a change of opinion about the morality of the war on behalf of
the population. Instead, the expressions of demoralisation and defeatism
amongst the ranks of those recently inspired to protest suggest another
explanation.
Many people appear to be expressing the sentiment that the war is over,
and that the military supremacy of the imperial forces displayed in the Gulf
demonstrates the unchallengeable might of US capitalism. It is precisely
this sentiment that Bush and Co are delighted to see being adopted at all
levels of society. If the impoverished majority of the world population
holds this opinion, they are unlikely to challenge the US Empire. If the
rich capitalists believe it, they are likely to invest. However, the
perspective put forward by Marxists appears to stand in stark contrast to
this defeatist position. In Lenin's view "the economic nature of
imperialism...[must be defined as] capitalism in transition, or, more
precisely, as moribund capitalism."
How can Marxists come to such a conclusion? The answer lies in a materialist
analysis of imperialism that recognises its place within the process of
human evolution. Through such an analysis it can be shown that imperialism
has not only accelerates the development of society, but at the same time,
brings it to the point where it creates the necessity for the society to
overthrow the system which it serves.

Imperialism, the jack-boot of globalisation
Imperialism is not a recent phenomenon of human evolution. In fact its
origins can be found in embryonic stages of class society. In The Origin of
the Family, Private Property and the State, the co-founder of Marxist
theory, Frederich Engels demonstrates the materialist origin of imperialism.
As primitive tribes developed surplus supplies of food they began to free
themselves from the constant task of obtaining the means of subsistence.
Thus they enabled themselves to turn their forces towards warfare, expanding
their wealth through the conquest of territories and the enforcement of
slave labour. The Roman Empire grew to immense proportions upon this system,
its policy of enslavement and colonial development pushed its rule to the
far corners of Europe and beyond.
In all stages of human development imperialism has extended the boundaries
of human interaction. European explorers, funded by their respective
empires, paved the way for European imperialism to spread to every continent
on the planet. Upon reaching many of these far-flung regions of the world,
often the invaders discovered pre-existing imperialist systems, such as the
Incan empire that stretched for three thousand miles across South America.
In such cases these developed societies further accelerated the integration
of the world into a global economy. In South America the indigenous systems
of exploitation were so advanced that often the Spanish needed to do little
more than place themselves at the top of the pre-prepared food chain in
order to extract wealth from their colonies.

Imperialism as an impetus for social transformation
As Western European empires grew through imperialist expansion, their
social structures were ultimately transformed to produce the equipment
necessary to run their economies. The task of producing modern weaponry and
transport systems fell upon the merchants and embryonic bourgeoisie, whose
wealth was based on industry, trade and factories.
The great need for these products lead to the rapid growth of this class,
to the point where it challenged the rule of the monarchies and landed
classes. The bourgeois democratic revolutions in Western Europe overthrew
the feudal system, freeing up the distribution of capital that had been
stifled by the monopolies of the monarchies. Thus imperialism led to the
revolutionary development of a Bourgeois ruling class and the rise of
capitalism as the dominant mode of production in Europe.

Imperialism under Capitalism
The essential nature of the capitalism is the persuit of profit which leads
to a frenzied attempt to revolutionising the means of production by
individual companies to out-compete and out-trade their competitors. By
overthrowing the monopolies of the European kingdoms, the road was cleared
for many
capitalist enterprises to flourish and expand their industries, competing
with each other for market supremacy. However, as anyone who has played
Monopoly would know, a stage is reached where the available wealth becomes
concentrated in the hands of fewer and fewer players. Eventually the game is
brought to a conclusion, the competition is muscled out of the race.
Once again imperialism, through its natural development of monopolies,
appears to present huge problems for the class system that it serves. Lenin
outlines this contradiction in his analysis of contemporary imperialism:
Imperialism the Highest Stage of Capitalism. He states "it can be seen that,
at a certain stage of its development, concentration itself, as it were,
leads right to monopoly; for a score or so of giant enterprises can easily
arrive at an agreement, while on the other hand, the difficulty of
competition and the tendency towards monopoly arise from the very dimensions
of the enterprises. This transformation of competition into monopoly is one
of the most important - if not the most important ñ phenomena of modern
capitalist economy."
In order to define the specific nature of imperialism within capitalism,
Lenin identifies five essential features that it will display:
1) The concentration of production and capital developed to such a high
state that it create[s] monopolies which play a decisive role in economic
life.
2) The merging of bank capital with industrial capital, and the creation,
on the basis of this 'finance capital', of the financial oligarchy.
3) The export of capital, which become[s] extremely important, as
distinguished from the export of commodities.
4) The formation of international capitalist monopolies which share the
world among themselves.
5) The territorial division of the whole world among the greatest
capitalist powers.
A quick glance at current world events is enough to show that all these
features are now firmly established as the primary shaping factors of the
world economy. The policies of the IMF and the World Bank show the extent to
which the monopoly on finance capital directs economic development. The
export of capital to third world nations has funded the development of
sweat-shops, where the majority of the worldís products can be produced at a
bargain price though the super-exploitation of workers. Finally, as the
recent developments in the gulf have shown, the US and allied oil monopolies
have directed the territorial re-division of the world to suit their
business interests.

Social change long overdue
The accuracy of Lenin's analysis was not due to some super-human prophetic
intuition. Rather the events in his time were already demonstrating these
tendencies. For instance, as early as 1907, a huge struggle raged between
the US owned Standard Oil Company and the Anglo-Dutch Shell trust for
control of the Rumanian oil industry. The dispute was dubbed "the struggle
for the division of the world." It takes little to see the similarities with
Bush's 'war for oil'.
Imperialism had already brought capitalism to its zenith by the turn of
the century. Since this point, the contradictions between competition and
monopoly have frequently boiled over, leading to cyclic periods of
depression and world war. If Lenin could consider imperialism as a symbol of
'capitalism in transition' in 1917, it could well be said that this
transition is long overdue.

The limits of empire
As the capitalists driving the US Empire usurp and eradicate their rivals
in their quest for economic supremacy, their actions only increase the rate
at which the foundations of capitalism are being eroded beneath them. The
financial strain upon the Empire is evident in its inability to take full
control of its territories. US forces are unable to build their own
foundations of rule in Iraq. Like the Roman army, the Americans reside in
heavily fortified enclaves, patrolling the cities and maintaining control
though massive retaliation to acts of resistance. Due to the hatred that the
Iraqis hold for their imperial rulers, no popular national figure could be
found for the imperial control of Iraq. Therefore US administration has
given the task to the ex US General and arms trader, Jay Garner, a modern
day Viceroy. Such comparisons to the Empires of old further demonstrate the
tenuous state of the Bourgeoisiesí claims to power.

The conditions for change have never been greater
Just as social structures changed to facilitate imperialist expansion in
feudal times, the same processes can be seen within capitalism. Under
capitalism the growth of the working class has taken place within every
country on the planet. The working class is now responsible for the
production, maintenance and control of all the products and systems which
fuel and integrate the global economy. As the bourgeois class had in
feudal times, workers now form the progressive class with the knowledge and
ability to run society. Imperialism under capitalism has brought these
conditions about. The prolonged development of imperialism only increases
the urgent need for the working class to overthrow the capitalist monopolies
that are stifling the progression of humanity.

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