Imperialism : was Arms production + Dept III

[Adam Rose <adam@xxxxxxxx>]

>
> > Well, why did Imperialism give capitalism a 50 year boom ?
>
> Well, I don't think the expansion of capitalist accumulation can be
> understood entirely due to imperialism. Of course, that gets to the
> question: what is imperialism? Lenin's pamphlet, I believe, doesn't offer
> entirely satisfactory answers to this question (although, he acknowledges
> that it was to be a popular outline and asked others to investigate the
> subject further). In a *very* general sense, I would say that the boom
> was made possible both by the expansion of domestic markets (due to mass
> production and expanding means of consumption goods) and the increased
> internationalization of capital which both increased access to raw
> materials and provided an additional market for commodities (although,
> most commodities were either sold domestically during this period or
> sold on markets in other advanced capitalist nations). Sorry for the short
> answer, but it is a complex topic.
>

This is more description than explanation. The tendency of the rate of
profit to fall would predict that even though the total amount of
capital increases, there is an increasing tendency to crisis. Yet for
50 years, the opposite happened.

Why should expansion of either domestic and / or international markets
in itself alleviate the crisis ?

Adam.

Adam Rose
SWP
Manchester
UK


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