On Social Imperialism (Reply to dms)

["D OC" <donaloc@xxxxxxxxxxx>]

A chairde,

I just thought I'd give my 5 cent worth of contribution to the debate on
social imperialism. Note: I'm boycotting the s in that currency unit ;)

Anyhow, David wrote a rather defensive response to something which Nestor
and V.Stolz wrote on the perception from anti-imperialists in (neo-)colonial
societies towards the difficulties associated with social-imperialist
tendencies. I had to say my agreement with what they were saying came fairly
naturally to me -both in terms of my personal dislike of the lecturing tone
many self-appointed revolutionary stars take, the often complete absence of
anything approaching a serious strategy for action and in terms of the
reality of the failure of the revolutionary process in the West.

I'm no great world-systems analyst - there are plenty on this list - so what
follows is merely a my views on what David is talking about. I have tried
throughout to empathise with his urge 'to do something' truly revolutionary.
So what follows is not a finalised argument just a counter-thesis from a
different perspective.

> 1. Lenin's work on imperialism was primarily polemical to answer Kautsky's
mythology of homogenized unconflicted capitalism.  Lenin's analysis of the
mechanisms and details of accumulation is mistaken, incomplete, awkward, and
inadequate.

Well, I still find that book the most invaluable one in my collection - and
I have quite a collection. For me, it was the book which won me to
scientific socialism. I found the arguments very well made, okay a little
awkward but great. In particular, I find his work stands the test of time
and can be dusted off and updated to combat the fallacies of Negri-Hardt and
the liquidationist headcases.

2. Lenin's rentier state does not exist.  Moreover, no mechanism for bribing
the working class by distributing profits from more exploited areas has been
discovered or described.  Indeed, in this period of supposedly unchecked US
imperialism, working class conditions have worsened-- as they did concretely
between 1973 and 1993.

You must be kidding on this. Britain's whole economy rests on the strength
of London - and that, in turn, rests on the financial markets (which are
directly exploitative of the third world). Furthermore, your division of
beneficiaries and the argument that these are only non-proletarian misses
the whole point of secondary and indirect flows of expropriated wealth.
Furthermore, your assessment ignores the whole inherited wealth of these
areas from previous eras of super-exploitation and slavery. If that was not
enough that quote of Rhodes about the necessity of empire for capitalism is
a killer of such arguments. As for your argument over working-class
conditions worsening in this period (I assume you are correct in this) - the
point is not whether they have increased or decreased objectively but
whether they have retained a substantial differential with those of the
periphery populations. If working-class conditions have become marginally
worse in the USA, Britain, France and Germany, they have risen relative to
those in the 'third world' as those have plummeted substantially. Your
arguments parallel those who say that the condition of the Protestant
working-class is not improved by partition in Ireland, yet the real argument
is about relative levels of prosperity.

3. To use a phrase like "bourgeoisification of the working class" may be
cathartic to the individual using it, but it is certainly not analytic.  If
the working class is not or no longer or permanently unrevolutionary then it
is necessary to dispense IN TOTAL with Marx's analysis of capital  and
replace it with some other because Marxism is of a whole; the class
structure and struggle is the logic, the very substance of commodity
production which manifests itself in overproduction, reproduction, technical
advance and decline, destruction of values, and the necessity-- necessity
requiring, meaning AGENT-- of revolution.

Well, this I kind of have a sympathy for, as I realise the need to combat
post-marxist non-proletarian formulations. I don't, however, think that this
is what's being promoted. What you in the imperialist centres must realise
is that strategically the most important thing to undermine is the whole
imperialist domination of the world. The destruction of capitalism will flow
from that. At least, that's what I think. Perhaps that's why Marx said that
the Irish question was central to the English working class revolution.
Correctly working on that issue (colonialism generally) was worth more than
all the trade union actions put together. Of course, that's precisely
opposite to what's natural to the working-class. As such, we end up with
social democracy (which appears to be making some sort of threatened
come-back right now in Britain). In that sense, what might be most
appropriate in terms of a focus for left-activists is a
left-reformist/radical line in terms of the home/domestic economy - perhaps
in terms of social welfare, against corruption and big business domination,
that might then be usefully tied to a vigorous anti-imperialism. The two
could be made quite popular, I would have thought. If this is what is being
suggested by the other contributors here, then I think I agree. Just for the
record, I think living in Ireland and understanding the dynamics of both EU
integrationist agendas and the experience of being a dependent economy gives
us a good idea of a possible pathway on this - that's not to pull rank but
just to set my suggestions in context).

4.  Not to put too fine a point on it, but the revolutions created by
"wretched of the earth" have not been able to reproduce themselves on the
necessary scale to either ensure their own survival or overthrow the
mechanisms of international capitalist expropriation.  Those revolutions are
unwinding, some more slowly than others, as we speak.

If you mean unwinding as 'degenerating' or the like, then I think you are
missing the reality. Things are in a state of flux in the dependent
countries, conditions worsen, popular forces come to the fore, they are
forced out by global imperialist interests and things go back. As such,
there is a process of change constantly occuring in most countries. The
interesting bit I think (perhaps optimistically) is that we are seeing a
tendency towards more progressive governments as opposed to less. That's
simply a reflection of the dialectic being pushed towards progressive
outcomes as a result of the increased impoverishment of the third world.
Coupled to that, we are now seeing the emergence of a pan-post colonial
consensus - taking the form of China - Southern Africa - Progressive Latin
America, it is an interesting point to see if the initial successes at the
WTO can be replicated using the internal pressures within imperialist
centres against the inhuman policies of globalised neoliberalism. The
flip-side, of course, is that things could be reversed and the FTAA and EU
imperialist demands (that post-colonial governments be held liable for
losses in income of TNCs associated with their policies) become enshrined.
This would effectively close the door to democratic government across the
third world. I guess most could understand where things would go then. We'd
have a new wave of counter-imperialist revolutions against these laws and
rules.

5. To suggest that the best or most the advanced arenas can contribute is to
support other struggles, to decry and "curb" the crimes of the "advanced
bourgeoisie" is to argue implicitly for abandoning any effort to generate a
class based struggle in the advanced arena-- it is to argue for a program of
moral protest over one of class power, thus ensuring the failure of
revolutionary struggles everywhere.

Of course, that's not the only thing that they can do. It is however a core
requirement that they do it - as they haven't done it well previously. Just
look at the progressive French PCF (who I have a great deal of respect for
in terms of their approach to gaining state power) - they were totally
oblivious to the colonial aspects of French capitalism. You are
misconstrueing 'objective class interest' with moral injunctions also. It is
in the objective (long-term) interests of the working-class in imperialist
centres to overthrow imperialism. I think you'll find we could all live
quite well if we could share that wealth. The great lie is that this could
not be the case. Perhaps someone else could do the elementary maths of all
that.

Anyhow, just a few thoughts.

Is mise
DoC

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