[Marxism] A diminishing gap?

[Louis Proyect <lnp3@xxxxxxxxx>]

The country that is more developed industrially only shows, to the less 
developed, the image of its own future.

Karl Marx, Preface to V. 1 of Capital (1867 German Edition)

===

"In contrast to the economic systems which preceded it, capitalism 
inherently and constantly aims at economic expansion, at the penetration of 
new territories, the surmounting of economic differences, the conversion of 
self-sufficient provincial and national economies into a system of 
financial interrelationships. Thereby it brings about their rapprochement 
and equalizes the economic and cultural levels of the most progressive and 
the most backward countries. Without this main process, it would be 
impossible to conceive of the levelling out, first, of Europe with Great 
Britain, and then, of America with Europe; the industrialization of the 
colonies, the diminishing gap between India and Great Britain."

Leon Trotsky, Third International After Lenin

===

2020 Vision
A CIA report predicts that American global dominance could end in 15 years.
By Fred Kaplan, slate.com
Posted Wednesday, Jan. 26, 2005, at 2:48 PM PT

Who will be the first politician brave enough to declare publicly that the 
United States is a declining power and that America's leaders must urgently 
discuss what to do about it? This prognosis of decline comes not (or not 
only) from leftist scribes rooting for imperialism's downfall, but from the 
National Intelligence Council?the "center of strategic thinking" inside the 
U.S. intelligence community.

The NIC's conclusions are starkly presented in a new 119-page document, 
"Mapping the Global Future: Report of the National Intelligence Council's 
2020 Project." It is unclassified and available on the CIA's Web site. The 
report has received modest press attention the past couple weeks, mainly 
for its prediction that, in the year 2020, "political Islam" will still be 
"a potent force." Only a few stories or columns have taken note of its 
central conclusion:

"The likely emergence of China and India ... as new major global 
players?similar to the advent of a united Germany in the 19th century and a 
powerful United States in the early 20th century?will transform the 
geopolitical landscape with impacts potentially as dramatic as those in the 
previous two centuries."

In this new world, a mere 15 years away, the United States will remain "an 
important shaper of the international order"?probably the single most 
powerful country?but its "relative power position" will have "eroded." The 
new "arriviste powers"?not only China and India, but also Brazil, 
Indonesia, and perhaps others?will accelerate this erosion by pursuing 
"strategies designed to exclude or isolate the United States" in order to 
"force or cajole" us into playing by their rules.

full: http://slate.msn.com/default.aspx?id=2112697


Louis Proyect
Marxism list: www.marxmail.org 


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