Imperialism, globalization, a stinkweed by any other name..
By Scott Marshall
There is a clear trend in the fight against capitalist globalization.
Around the world, and in the US, labor is stepping to the front lines of
this battle. While still in the early stages, many diverse and powerful
anti-monopoly, anti-corporate coalitions are developing.
Much of the development of these movements so far has been spontaneous.
Capitalist globalization has hurt so many people, in so many different
ways, that it produces angry victims with many diverse sets of concerns -
workers, farmers, environmentalists, peace activists, women, youth and
student, faith based and religious, small business, independent mass media,
cultural workers and scientists to name some of the main groups.
Unity and mass action so far has been based on identifying a common enemy.
Every group can agree that the WTO, the IMF and the World Bank are harmful
to their interests. However, most have differing and even contradictory
views on what should be done with them - reform or abolish - necessary and
legitimate or no redeeming quality at all. And, as is natural, there are
differences within these groups themselves on what is to be done.
Already, a long series of mass demonstrations, from Seattle to Geneva, from
Washington DC to Singapore, have backed up the multinationals and forced
serious debate in the ranks of global capitalist organizations like the
IMF, the WTO and the World Bank.
On a parallel track, anti-imperialist sentiment has been building in the
wake of NATO's criminal interventions in the Balkans and the naked use of
force for so-called "humanitarian" goals in many parts of the world. The US
military openly pursues a policy of being able to intervene militarily in
many different situations at the same time. This multi-interventionist
policy in part explains the criminal behavior of the US Navy on the Puerto
Rican Island of Vieques. They have to train for invasions. Or to paraphrase
a New York Times columnist, MacDonnell Douglas makes the world safe for
McDonalds.
Where do we go from here?
With all the anti-globalization activity, in the heat of battle as it were,
the obvious questions arise. The unions and the mass movements are asking
themselves, "what's next?" A healthy debate is taking place on strategy and
tactics. Should we demand the abolishment of the World Trade Organization
(WTO)? Doesn't someone have to regulate trade world wide? How can trade
unions effectively fight multi-national corporations spread all over the
globe? What is the role of nation states in the new global economy?
In many ways all these questions boil down to a very basic question. How
will these movements arrive at a positive program of demands and actions to
curb or even roll back capitalist globalization? It is clear to most
everyone that just opposing the institutions of corporate global domination
like the IMF, the World Bank, the WTO and NATO is not enough. We need
reform demands that masses and movements can grab onto as they have grabbed
onto the anti-WTO movement.
And what about the left?
For Communists and the broader left there is even a greater challenge. We
are a critical part of these mass coalitions. Most of these coalitions,
especially with labor, have a decided left-center character and unity.
Strong left-center ties are being built on bonds of common action and
common militancy against corporate domination. We Communists are, and have
to be even more, "in the mix" of these struggles. We have to be among the
most active in building these coalitions and in fighting for the greatest
possible left-center unity. We have to be even more effective in helping to
find winning strategies to curb and reform globalization in the interests
of defending working people and working families at home and abroad.
At the same time, we have to further develop a Communist, or
Marxist-Leninist, but popular, critique of capitalism, imperialism and
globalization. We freely acknowledge that we don't have all the answers,
nor even all the questions. But we do know one thing for sure there is no
real and lasting solution to capitalist globalization that leaves the
multi-national corporations, finance capital, and the imperialist
institutions of global power in charge. This is why we believe in
socialism. This is why we are revolutionaries.
We also know the truth that Lenin pointed out in his famous book,
'Imperialism, the Highest Stage of Capitalism,' that imperialism and
globalization are not just "bad policies" of the capitalist class, or of
the industrial countries, or of the WTO. They are rather the "natural"
development of capitalism, unchecked and unregulated. They are developments
of the capitalist system itself and thus are not subject to change simply
by changed policies the system itself must be changed to do away with the
evils of imperialism and globalization.
And this knowledge imposes on us "that most difficult of all tasks," what
Lenin called, "patiently to explain." I would add for today's usage,
"patiently to question, to probe and discuss with others in an open, frank
and friendly way."
In that spirit we Communists need to do our part in initiating discussion
of capitalist globalization. Our part, means coming at the question from
our distinct point of view. It means discussing popular demands to curb
imperialist globalization and, at the same time, it means discussing how to
convince the American working class and people of the need for Bill of
Rights Socialism USA.
A tall order and one certainly beyond the scope of this article. But
hopefully we can use this piece to kick off even more debate and discussion
on globalization in our party, in the broader left and among our friends,
allies and coalition partners.
Imperialism or globalization or both?
Lenin wrote in his preface to his famous work 'Imperialism' the following:
"Railways are a summation of the basic capitalist industries, coal, iron
and steel; a summation and the most striking index of the development of
world trade and bourgeois-democratic civilization. How the railways are
linked up with large-scale industry, with monopolies, syndicates, cartels,
trusts, banks and the financial oligarchy is shown in the proceeding
chapters of this book. The uneven distribution of railways, their uneven
development sums up as it were, modern monopolist capitalism on a
world-wide scale."
It is tempting to just substitute the word "computer" for the word
"railways" in the quote above. Of course it's not so simple. The quote
above does illustrate that much has changed in the specifics of imperialism
and world capitalism. But we can recognize enough that is the same in the
quote to show that each new situation and subsequent creative development
of Marxist analysis must be built on solid basics that have come before.
Perhaps the most revealing sentence in the paragraph is: "How the railways
are linked up with large-scale industry, with monopolies, syndicates,
cartels, trusts, banks and the financial oligarchy is shown in the
proceeding chapters of this book." It indicates the tremendous importance
Lenin placed on rigorous examination of facts and figures, of study of the
exact situation. This too, must be a central part of our methodology today.
Lenin read not only the statistical data of his day, but all the bourgeois
scientists and essayist of his day.
Lenin was writing at the dawn of the 20th Century, now, a hundred years
later at the dawn of the 21st Century we need to update and creatively
apply Marx and Lenin's great contributions to a very different and new
situation. Lenin put it this way in 'Our Program:'
"We do not regard Marx's theory as something complete and inviolable; on
the contrary, we are convinced that it has only laid the foundation stone
of the science which socialist must develop in all directions if they wish
to keep pace with life."
Is globalization just a new name for the imperialism that Lenin described?
Or is it a new stage or level of capitalism? And what real difference does
it make how we answer those questions? It makes no difference in a sterile
and sectarian debate. These questions do make a difference, however, if we
approach them from the point of view of what is new and developing in
capitalist relations and in the class struggle around us. What are some of
the new features of globalization?
Scale
In Lenin's 'Imperialism' he spoke of the US having about 51 million German
marks in direct overseas investments. According to the Department of
Commerce's Bureau of Economic Analysis the US had direct overseas
investments of approximately 2 trillion, 140 billion, 582 million dollars
in market value in 1998. That compares to about $72.9 billion US direct
investment overseas in 1966. Even allowing for inflation and the growth in
national economies, etc this is an increase in scale that could not have
been imagined in Lenin's time.
The production process
This illustrates that both Marx and Lenin were correct in their projections
that capitalism and imperialism would result in ever larger monopoly
concentrations of capital, wealth and power. But they could not have
foreseen just how behemoth these concentrations could become. At some point
it's no longer just more of the same. And certainly basic industry has
expanded far beyond coal, iron and steel, railways and the other mass
production industries of Lenin's time.
In 'Imperialism' Lenin describes how then modern capitalism, in the era of
imperialism, was being concentrated into larger and larger factories and
workplaces. It took huge outlays of capital to make effective use of the
then new science and technology of electricity and machinery. The new
production processes were huge and required large concentrations of workers
to make them effective and productive.
Today the trend is in the opposite direction. New science and technology is
making huge factories obsolete. The mechanics of production and micro
circuitry are shrinking production facilities. Where once all aspects of
production needed to be right at hand and physically and mechanically
integrated including raw materials, sub assemblies, power plants, and
services, etc. Today, computers and modular production processes, combined
with much greater control over faster and more sophisticated transportation
and communications systems make for the fracturing and decentralization of
production into smaller and smaller units, often spread out to all corners
of the globe.
No one builds integrated steel mills, centralized near good water
transportation and near raw materials, today they build mini-mills for
individual product lines near the markets they hope to serve.
For just a taste of how transportation has changed try buying a product
online over the internet. Most often you are given a tracking number that
can tell you on a minute by minute basis, where your package is and when it
is due to arrive at your doorstep. It is easy to see the implications of
such precision in organizing complex and diverse world wide production
processes.
The working class is bigger
At the same time new technology has considerably reshaped the kinds of
skills needed for production. Many skills have migrated off the shop or
production floor into offices changing the face of the workforce and
somewhat blurring the distinction between what was known as blue collar and
white collar work. At the same time whole new industries like electronics,
chips and robots, pharmaceuticals, and many others have grown up.
Millions have been brought into the working class through a raft of new
services that are the result of continued socialization of production and
daily life. Today the working class is numerically, and as a percentage of
the population, bigger than ever before in history. This has profound
implications for those who see the revolutionary role of labor and the
working class.
Finance capital
Lenin pointed to the growth and parasitic nature of finance capital in the
era of imperialism. He would be astounded at where this has developed in
globalization. In the first place the scale would be unrecognizable and in
the second place the computer technology that makes it all possible was not
dreamed of in his time. Just a few facts from the UN's Human Development
Report of 1999 will illustrate the point. In the 1970's the daily turnover
in foreign exchange markets was about $10 to $20 billion. In 1998 it
reached $1.5 trillion a day. International bank lending grew from $265
billion in 1975 to $4.2 trillion in 1994 in just under twenty years. And
finally, between 1983 and 1993 cross border sales of US Treasury bonds
increased from $30 billion to $500 billion.
Even given a larger population and more developed areas of the globe, it
must be clear that finance capital which Lenin and Marx both described as
parasitic and 'dead' capital and the most reactionary and predatory section
of capital is a much larger percentage of world capital. Lenin began to
describe in 'Imperialism' how finance capital is inextricably tied to
industrial and all other forms of capital.
Today that is even more so. Globalization, export and import trade,
shifting manufacturing, improvements in transportation and communications,
the new technologies including biotechnologies are all tightly bound to
finance capital. Nothing in the global economy is built, exported or
imported, insured, financed or moved without a slice off the top for
finance capital. Today, finance capital is qualitatively more the "mover
and shaper", the "command and control" of globalization and development
than ever before. Peoples fears about national independence and sovereignty
are just the first glimmers of what finance capital has in store for us if
not stopped.
When Lenin wrote, a large share of direct overseas investment was in the
plundering of natural resources of colonial countries. Today, even though
direct foreign investment has grown seven times on a world scale since the
1970's, the bulk (58%) is invested in the industrial capitalist countries.
Only 37% is invested in developing countries with the rest (5%) being
invested in the former socialist countries in Russian and Eastern Europe.
This includes the fact that capitalists in many developing countries, like
South Africa, invest their profits heavily in industrial countries instead
of their own economies. Much of this is speculative capital or to speak
bluntly just plain gambling.
This investment pattern of globalization has tremendous significance for
the labor movements in America and the other developed capitalist
countries. The UN report on Human Development points out that less than a
tenth of the job loss in the US can be attributed to US capital flight to
Third World or underdeveloped countries.
This is important to see, because once this is understood then it's easier
to see that General Motors, US Steel and General Dynamic are the real
enemies of working families, their jobs and their communities, not the
workers of Mexico and China. More jobs are lost in multinational
mergermania and conglomeration than in export of capital to developing
countries. To be sure global capital pursues cheap labor in the "race to
the bottom," but there is a lot more going on here, especially with finance
capital's role in globalization.
Mergermania
Deregulation and the weakening of anti-trust laws, especially in the arena
of banking and finance has led to an unpredicted orgy of mergers and
acquisitions. This has been particularly the case with the multinationals.
Global scale megamergers like Daimler Chrysler, Exxon-Mobil and world
banking mergers like Bank One and First Chicago set the pace.
A totally new feature of globalization is the tremendous domination of
news, information, media and culture by giant multinational conglomerates;
Warner ate Time, Time Warner ate CNN, America Online ate Time Warner or was
it the other way around anyway you get the picture.
"From 1990 to 1997 the annual number of mergers and acquisitions more than
doubled from 11,300 to 24,600. Cross-border mergers and acquisitions
accounted for $236 billion in 1997," according UN figures. According to a
chart in Forbes magazine, corporations like General Motors, Ford,
Mitsubishi, Shell, Exxon, WalMart, and many others have gross sales that
exceed the GDP of many countries.
World trade
World exports have now reached an astounding $7 trillion a year. That is
about 21% of the world's Gross Domestic Product (GDP) in the 1990's. That
compares to 17% of a much smaller GDP in the 1970's. World exports of goods
and services almost tripled between the 1970's and 1997 in real adjusted
dollars. According to the UN report "the top fifth of the world's people in
the richest countries enjoy 82% of the expanding export trade and 68% of
foreign direct investment the bottom fifth, barely more than 1%.
And of course, for the first time in history we have the World Trade
Organization, with the power, through it's ability to impose trade
sanctions, to overrule nation states in favor of the multinationals and
finance capital's trading goals and policies.
Rising and savage inequalities
All of this has had a devastating impact on the world's working class and
people. World inequalities have been rising steadily for the last century
of imperialism and globalization. They are accelerating today. In world
income distributions between rich and poor countries the pattern is thus:
In 1820 the ratio of rich to poor country was about 3 to 1, that is rich
countries had about 3 times the assets and wealth of poor countries. In the
1950 it was 35 to 1. In 1973 it rose to 44 to one and in 1992 it had risen
to a ratio of 72 to 1.
Here are some startling statistics on the poverty that imperialism and
globalization leave in its wake. Nearly 1.3 billion people on this planet
have no access to clean water. One child in seven of primary school age is
not in school. More than 840 million people are malnourished with a very
high percentage being women and children. The UN estimates that 1.3 billion
people live on incomes of less than a $1 a day.
In the industrial countries, though often hidden, human poverty and
exclusion are also on the rise. In the eight richest countries one out of
every eight people is stricken by one of more of the main poverty
indicators for industrial countries: long term unemployment, life
expectancy under 60 years, an income below the national poverty line or
illiteracy. Wage inequality, that is the gap between the highest wages and
lowest wages has continued to widen in every industrial country except
Germany and Italy. And there were drastic reductions in social programs
almost across the board.
Racism and national chauvinism, and gender inequality
One aspect of imperialism and globalization that many of these statistics
do not illustrate well enough is the extra cutting edge caused by racism
and national oppression. Any map that illustrates the patterns of global
investments, or that charts the poverty ratios of the world will make the
point. There are more than enough statistics available in the US to prove
the impact of racism and chauvinism on poverty, unemployment, lack of
health care, lack of decent housing, etc in the US. What is not so apparent
to many is the conscious role of imperialism and globalization in fostering
and creating these extra burdens of inequality.
Take the debates in the WTO itself. It was clear in Seattle that one factor
in the failure of those talks, besides the mass pressure outside, was the
dissatisfaction of delegates from the underdeveloped countries especially
from Africa, Asia, South America and the Middle East. In the news reports
delegates said that seeing the resistance to the WTO in the streets
emboldened them to stand up to the industrialized countries demands. They
cited unfair and exploitative trade rules and policies being forced on them
by the G-7 countries. Many also pointed to the totally undemocratic
structure of the WTO that has a "secret" closed door governing committee
that is basically comprised of the industrial architects of capitalist
globalization.
According to the UN report foreign investment has meant an increase in
women in the workforce. But they note that for many women this amounts to
extending their workday by eight to ten hours when allowing for unpaid work
that many women perform. In addition they point out that much of the
increase in women's employment in the last few years has been in what is
known as the informal economy. These jobs are most often very substandard.
They are frequently part-time, they often are home-work situations, and
most are also "off the books" making for easy cheating on wages and hours.
Two more related changes in globalization
When Lenin wrote 'Imperialism' a world socialist system was coming into
being. Today, while some of that system still exists, it is greatly
weakened. This relative lack of a socialist counterbalance has emboldened
capitalism to new heights of globalization and savagery. The 1990's saw a
world-wide offensive to weaken labor, to privatize and destroy the public
sector, to demolish social programs and to turn back the clock on freedom
and equality struggles. There can be little doubt that this onslaught was
fueled by the phony ideological triumphalism over the end of the Cold War.
It also saw the increased willingness of US imperialism to use force in the
world to support its global aims.
The setbacks to socialism was a terrible blow to the world peace forces.
Movements for nuclear disarmament, solidarity movements, and liberation
movements all took a beating and seemed in many cases to run out of steam
or adopt more defensive postures. (One important exception being the final
defeat of Apartheid in South Africa.) This trend was natural given the
emergence of "one world superpower." Even much of the anti-Soviet left was
stunned by how badly their efforts and movements were blunted by the
setbacks to socialism.
Not even at the end of World War Two was US imperialism in such an
unchallenged position as "top dog" of world imperialism. Today, while
inter-imperialist rivalry is still very much a feature of globalization,
there is no serious challenge to US military might. In the past few months
the European Union made noise about setting up an independent military
structure for it forces nothing has happened and NATO still rules the
roost in Europe. And while there is chatter about US plans to establish an
anti-ballistic missile (ABM) system, there is no real challenge. This is a
dangerous military corporate boondoggle that is clearly in violation of
many treaties signed by the US.
Also it is clear that even a "one world superpower" with unchallenged
military superiority does not mean an end to war dangers. We only need to
look at the military destruction rained down on the Balkans, the continued
bombing of Iraq or the continued bombing of Vieques to see the danger.
This unbridled US power is a totally new feature of globalization. While it
is most clear in the military arena, US domination of globalization is
apparent in trade and in the institutions of global governance like the
WTO, the IMF and the World Bank. This in no way means an end to the
contradictions between imperial powers but it does give the deadening
appearance of power so great as to be unchangeable.
Some tentative conclusions
In South Africa, labor and Communist activists speak of fighting TINA. It
means There Is No Alternative. This is clearly the mass line of
globalization. All their think tanks and all their apologist for
imperialism work overtime to try and convince the working people of the
world that capitalist globalization is it end of history. And they are
very keen on trying to convince the left that only modest reforms of the
system are possible.
One of Lenin's greatest contributions in 'Imperialism' is the idea that
imperialism cannot be fought in little pieces. It is not enough to fight
only against this or that manifestation of imperialism or globalization. It
must be fought by Communists and the left in particular as a system of
relations. It's what some might call fighting the big picture. To put it
another way, while we have to be deeply involved in every fight, against
every aspect of capitalist globalization, we have to constantly show those
we fight with the system of imperialism and that can't be done effectively
without presenting an alternative socialism.
This isn't a call for breast beating or holding up signs that read
socialism now. But it does mean that how we introduce the question of
socialism as the ONLY alternative to capitalist globalization is a critical
task right now. Ultimately we cannot defeat TINA without it. There are no
effective stages here. We have to bring the courage of our convictions into
the mix of our allies and coalition partners fighting globalization. It we
don't, cynicism, detours, and disillusionment are bound to follow.
Boldly search for struggles that target the multinationals
We need, with our coalition partners and allies, to think big and bold. We
know many of the demands that begin to make up an anti-globalization program:
* Curbs and taxes on capital exports how about the requirement that
corporations invest $5 at home for every $1 they invest overseas. In the US
just closing investment tax loopholes on foreign investments would bring
hundreds of million in new revenues that could be spent on public works and
job creation. This must include full taxation on overseas US corporate
profits made by foreign branches, subsidiaries and sub contractors.
* Abolish the WTO and instead deal with trade issues and trade treaties
through the International Labor Organization (ILO) and the UN. These are
far more democratic international organizations that already include the
participation of labor and other public interest Non-Governmental
Organizations (NGO's).
* The US Congress should immediately ratify the six core labor conventions
of the ILO that they have refused to confirm, including the right to
collective bargaining, the right to organize, against all forms of racial,
national and gender discrimination, against child labor, and against forced
and slave labor.
* Cancel the debt of developing countries and fully fund the UN Development
agencies. The US government should immediately live up to it's financial
responsibilities and pay up it's dues.
* A corporate code of conduct, enforceable by the US Congress on US
corporations abroad that include the right to organize, collective
bargaining and minimum wage, health and safety, and environmental standards.
Again these are just a bare minimum to get the discussion going. It is
clear that broad international anti-monopoly, anti-corporate globalization
coalitions can be built with world labor at it's core. I was struck by one
of the demands put forward by the UN Report on Human Development. They
called for "a world antimonopoly authority to monitor the activities of
multinational corporations and ensure that markets are competitive." If the
UN can make such a bold proposal then the world Communist and labor
movements ought to be able to come up with a militant program of action to
fight globalization.
One last point
There is nothing about globalization that makes it above the laws of
capitalist development presented by Marx and Engels. In fact capitalist
globalization, in its reality confirms all the laws and the internal
contradictions of capitalism presented by Marx.
For one the basic contradiction between the social and cooperative nature
of work versus private profit is intensified. The socialization process has
now intensified across borders in an unprecedented way. Today an auto
worker in Detroit knows a lot more about the conditions of an autoworker in
Mexico than previous generations and vise versa.
In the Communist Manifesto Marx remarked, "This union (of workers) is
helped by the improved means of communication that are created by modern
industry, and that place the workers in different localities in contact
with one another. It was just this contact that was needed to centralize
the numerous local struggles, all of the same character, into one national
struggle between classes."
What prophetic words for today's struggles against capitalist
globalization. Marching in Seattle, marching in Singapore, marching in
Johannesburg, striking in Ohio, striking in Osaka, sitting in at the
University of Wisconsin, sitting in in Indonesia, these are just the
contact we need to centralize numerous national struggles into one
international struggle against capitalist globalization.
So what's in a name?
Communists did not invent the term imperialism. But what Lenin did was take
a popular concept of his day and give it a scientific and Marxist
treatment. Clearly he stung the ruling classes of his day and far beyond
with his pamphlet. After Lenin, academic anti-communists spent forests of
paper trying to discredit and refute the work. J. Edgar Hoover even went so
far as to say that you could sniff out a communist by his or her use of the
term imperialism. Today there are still many on the left who fear the use
of the term because it might 'taint' them.
Today globalization is a popular mass concept associated with struggle and
resistance to multinational corporate domination. Hopefully, Communists and
the left today can take this popular concept and build a scientific and
Marxist mass understanding of what is new and developing in capitalism as a
global system of exploitation and oppression and how best to fight it.
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