Very interesting text. It shows how powerful is the movement among east Asian capitalists for their very survival to scrap the previous neo-liberal market fundamentalism. How far they could get with a single Asian currency is in the short term doubtful, but is seems highly likely they will want to press quickly and collectively for a taming of the hedge fund speculators and the volatility of forex markets. How far sighted their proposed reforms are remains to be seen.
>*************
>
>Lenin, "Imperialism, the Latest Stage of Capitalism":
>
>Certain bourgeois writers (whom K. Kautsky, who has completely abandoned
>the Marxist position he held, for example, in 1909, has now joined) have
>expressed the opinion that international cartels, being one of the most
>striking expressions of the internationalization of capital, give the hope
>of peace among nations under capitalism. Theoretically, this opinion is
>absolutely absurd, while in practice it is sophistry and a dishonest
>defense of the worst opportunism. International cartels show to what point
>capitalist monopolies have developed, and the object of the struggle
>between the various capitalist combines. This last circumstance is the most
>important, it alone shows us the historico-economic meaning of what is
>taking place; for the forms of the struggle may and do constantly change in
>accordance with varying, relatively particular and temporary causes, but
>the substance of the struggle, its class content, positively cannot change
>while classes exist. Naturally, it is in the interests of, for example, the
>German bourgeoisie, to whose side Kautsky has in effect gone over in his
>theoretical arguments (we will deal with this later), to obscure the
>substance of the present economic struggle (the division of the world) and
>to emphasize now this and now another form of the struggle.
Many serious marxists now consider Lenin's analysis of imperialism in 1916, based heavily on the work of Hobson, to be inadequate in some respects. One of these is Paul Cockshott, for whom Louis has expressed admiration.
On the passage quoted up to this point, I would say what has changed most, is the concept of the "division" of the world. In Lenin's day and for a few decades after, division of the world really meant division. Cartels meant massive trade barriers which could only be broken down by war. Now we are very far from that. We are certainly talking about a world in which the different capitals will dominate according to their relative strength, but they will continue to interpenetrate in the main capitalist economies. Eg the extent to which Brown and Williamson is US capital while its parent, British Anglo-American Tobacco (BAT) is British capital might need some quite detailed analysis. I do not imply that transnationals are purely transnational. But there is very considerable interpenetration of capitalist interests.
>Kautsky makes
>the same mistake. Of course, we have in mind not only the German
>bourgeoisie, but the bourgeoisie all over the world. The capitalists divide
>the world, not out of any particular malice, but because the degree of
>concentration which has been reached forces them to adopt this method in
>order to obtain profits. And they divide it "in proportion to capital," "in
>proportion to strength," because there cannot be any other method of
>division under commodity production and capitalism. But strength varies
>with the degree of economic and political development. In order to
>understand what is taking place, it is necessary to know what questions are
>settled by the changes in strength. The question as to whether these
>changes are "purely" economic or non-economic (e.g., military) is a
>secondary one, which cannot in the least affect the fundamental views on
>the latest epoch of capitalism. To substitute the question of the form of
>the struggle and agreements (today peaceful, tomorrow warlike, the next day
>warlike again) for the question of the substance of the struggle and
>agreements between capitalist combines is to sink to the role of a sophist.
>
>The epoch of the latest stage of capitalism shows us that certain relations
>between capitalist combines grow up, based on the economic division of the
>world, while parallel and in connection with it, certain relations grow up
>between political combines, between states, on the basis of the territorial
>division of the world, of the struggle for colonies, of the "struggle for
>economic territory."
The possibility of a political battle over the territorial division of the world does increase the risk of war, and a strict reading of Lenin's argument is that war is "inevitable".
But his criticism of Kautsky is more complex than implied. For example he criticised Kautsky for conceiving the latest stage of capital as essentially industrial capital plus the division of vast tracts of land in the form of colonies supplying agricultural goods and raw materials. Lenin criticised Kautsky's definition of imperialism as "a product of highly developed industrial capitalism" whereas he himself emphasised the domination of finance capitalism. He also criticised Kautsky for being two or three decades out of date in his analysis of capitalism, which would also be a mistake if we just apply what Lenin wrote in the second decade of this century.
I think Louis Proyect needs to demonstrate a much more sustained analysis of Lenin's criticism of Kautsky, of where Lenin's theory of imperialism remains valid, and where it needs to be altered, and above all modern data as to how developments with the euro are leading to war rather than peace. I have presented a historical survey which stands on its merits.
Chris Burford
London.