[lbo-talk] dev'ts in world economy and foreign ownership

[Doug Henwood]

I don't think capital is always pacific. The European colonization of  
Asia, Latin America, and Africa had a lot to do with the pursuit of  
profit. Capital was behind the long war against the USSR, the  
overthrow of any number of nationalists and socialists in the Third  
World, the 1980s proxy wars in LatAm, etc. The war against Communism  
was a high-risk enterprise, but it was for high stakes. The  
overthrows & proxy wars were important, but much lower risk.

But, to talk like an agency theorist, the exec branch may be the exec  
cmte of the bourgeoisie, but it has its own interests, just like the  
interests of corporate managers sometimes diverge from the  
shareholders'. The state loves war - the health of the state, as the  
man said. It increases the state's power of repression and  
surveillance, it makes the warriors feel bold and profound, it even  
allows the state to interfere in the economy. I think the war in Iraq  
has a lot of that aspect to it.

Doug