Theories of Imperialism revisited
Panagiotis Sotiris, University of Athens
The return of imperialism
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During the 1990’s ‘globalization’ emerged as the most convenient concept
to describe world affairs.
However, during the 2000s imperialism made an impressive come-back in
political and theoretical debates.
David Harvey’s New Imperialism, (Harvey 2003), Ellen Meksins Wood’s
Empire of Capital (Wood 2003) or Alex Callinicos’ The New Mandarins of
American Power (Callinicos 2003), on the Marxist side
The notions of empire and imperialism became pertinent again in
mainstream discussions of international relations and conflicts, exemplified
in calls for a liberal imperialism to deal with terrorism and rogue states
(Cooper 2002; Wolf 2001) and for the need for the US to act as a
benevolent imperial Hegemon (Kagan 1998; Boot 2001; Donnelly 2002) to
safeguard Western values and liberties. This mostly had to do with the
emergence of an aggressive American military interventionism, beginning
with the war in Afghanistan, the brutal occupation of Iraq, the plans for a
military strike against Iran.
The open questions for a Marxist
theory of imperialism
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Is a theory of imperialism simply a combination of
Marxist political economy and Realism?
Is it a theory of territorial expansion?
Is it a theory of a unified global system
Is a theory of Empire?
Theory of imperialism as Marxist Political
Economy combined with Realist Geopolitics
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Alex Callinicos has insisted on the need to incorporate the state
system and the conflicts and antagonisms at that level as “a
dimension of the capitalist mode of production” (Callinicos 2009, 83)
leading to the combination of two forms of competition, one among
capitals and a geopolitical competition between states (Callinicos
2005; 2007; 2009).
Gonzalo Pozo-Martin (2007) has shown that this ‘realist’ or
geopolitical moment needs much more theoretical elaboration, if we
want to avoid the theoretical shortcomings of traditional realist
conceptualizations of international relations.
Peter Gowan’s (1999) attempted towards a Marxist geopolitics of
American dominance, notwithstanding the accuracy of many of his
conclusions and despite his insistence that American foreign policy is
based on the promotion of American capitalist interests as national
interest.
Realism is not enough
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Realism has been the defining theoretical tradition in mainstream
International Relations theory (Carr 1939, Wight 1994, Waltz
1979, Frankel (ed.) 1996. For a criticism of traditional international
relations theory see Rosenberg 1994).
While realism is seen as having merit when contrasted with the
idealist rhetoric of most of current globalization or cosmopolitan
democracy theories, the simplistic Hobbesian conceptions of political
power and Great Power rivalry that are the backbone of realist
theories of International Relations do not offer a possible way to
theorize the complexity of determinations within the international
plane and the interrelation between economic, political and
ideological antagonisms.
Moreover, it remains a theoretical paradigm that leads to a rather
schematic territorial conception of the stakes in international conflicts
and antagonisms.
The persistence of the territorial logic
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On of the problems in contemporary Marxist theory of imperialism is
the persistence of the territorial logic
On example has been David Harvey’s theory of accumulation as
dispossession. (Harvey 2003)
For Harvey, capitalism not only induces a logic of endless flows of
capital but also brings forward the particular importance of spatiotemporal fixes in a social process of production of space that leads
to the historical geography of imperialism. This is also the basis of a
certain territorial logic that grounds the tendency towards
imperialism under capitalism.
Here accumulation by discpossession acquires importance, especially
in a period of capitalist overaccumulation, in the sense of a
predatory imperialist quest for assets all over the world, enhanced
by both financialization and privatization
Accumulation by dispossession
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Harvey links this to both Luxembourg’s theory of imperialism
and to Marx’s theory of primitive accumulation. However, he
insists that it is not limited to a particular historical period

The disadvantage of these assumptions is that they relegate
accumulation based upon predation, fraud, and violence to an
'original stage' that is considered no longer relevant or, as with
Luxemburg, as being somehow 'outside of capitalism as a closed
system. A general reevaluation of the continuous role and
persistence of the predatory practices of 'primitive' or 'original'
accumulation within the long historical geography of capital
accumulation is, therefore, very much in order, as several
commentators have recently observed. Since it seems peculiar to call
an ongoing process 'primitive' or 'original' I shall, in what follows,
substitute these terms by the concept of'accumulation by
dispossession'. (Harvey 2003, p. 144)
Accumulation by dispossession and
neoliberalism
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For Harvey accumulation by dispossession leads to neoliberalism
Accumulation by dispossession became increasingly more salient after 1973,
in part as compensation for the chronic problems of overaccumulation arising
within expanded reproduction. The primary vehicle for this development was
financialization and the orchestration, largely at the behest of the United
States, of an international financial system that could, from time to time, visit
anything from mild to savage bouts of devaluation and accumulation by
dispossession on certain sectors or even whole territories. But the opening up
of new territories to capitalist development and to capitalistic forms of market
behaviour also played a role, as did the primitive accumulations accomplished
in those countries (such as South Korea, Taiwan, and now, even more
dramatically, China) that sought to insert themselves into global capitalism as
active players. For all of this to occur required not only financialization and
freer trade, but a radically different approach to how state power, always a
major player in accumulation by dispossession, should be deployed. The rise of
neo-liberal theory and its associated politics of privatization symbolized much
of what this shift was about. (Harvey 2003, p. 156)
Contemporary Imperialism as
accumulation as dispossession
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The rise in importance of accumulation by
dispossession as an answer, symbolized by the rise of
an internationalist politics of neoliberalism and
privatization, correlates with the visitation.
Accumulation by Dispossession of periodic bouts of
predatory devaluation of assets in one part of the
world or another. And this seems to be the heart of
what contemporary imperialist practice is about.
(Harvey 2003, pp. 181-82)
The territorial logic revisited: Rosa
Luxembourg
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Imperialism is the political expression of the accumulation of capital in its competitive
struggle for what remains still open of the noncapitalist environment. Still the largest
part of the world in terms of geography, this remaining field for the expansion of
capital is yet insignificant as against the high level of development already attained by
the productive forces of capital; witness the immense masses of capital accumulated in
the old countries which seek an outlet for their surplus product and strive to capitalise
their surplus value, and the rapid change-over to capitalism of the pre-capitalist
civilisations. On the international stage, then, capital must take appropriate measures.
With the high development of the capitalist countries and their increasingly severe
competition in acquiring non-capitalist areas, imperialism grows in lawlessness and
violence, both in aggression against the non-capitalist world and in ever more serious
conflicts among the competing capitalist countries. But the more violently, ruthlessly and
thoroughly imperialism brings about the decline of non-capitalist civilisations, the more
rapidly it cuts the very ground from under the feet of capitalist accumulation. Though
imperialism is the historical method for prolonging the career of capitalism, it is also a
sure means of bringing it to a swift conclusion. This is not to say that capitalist
development must be actually driven to this extreme: the mere tendency towards
imperialism of itself takes forms which make the final phase of capitalism a period of
catastrophe. (Luxambourg 2003, pp. 426-7)
Luxembourg: Imperialism and War
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The other aspect of the accumulation of capital concerns the
relations between capitalism and the non-capitalist modes of
production which start making their appearance on the
international stage. Its predominant methods are colonial policy,
an international loan system—a policy of spheres of interest—
and war. Force, fraud, oppression, looting are openly displayed
without any attempt at concealment, and it requires an effort to
discover within this tangle of political violence and contests of
power the stern laws of the economic process. (Luxembourg
2003, p. 432)
The teleology of collapse
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the deep and fundamental antagonism between the
capacity to consume and the capacity to produce in a
capitalist society, a conflict resulting from the very
accumulation of capital which periodically bursts out
in crises and spurs capital on to a continual of the
market. (Luxemboug 2003, p. 327)
Such a position leads to the assumption that
capitalism will collapse the moment capitalist social
relations prevail all over the world
The need for expansion
In the 1915 Anti-critique Rosa Luxembourg described in the following
manner capital’s tendency towards expansion:
 Accumulation is impossible in an exclusively capitalist environment.
Therefore, we find that capital has been driven since its very inception
to expand into non..capitalist strata and nations, ruin artisans and
peasantry, proletarianize the intermediate strata, the politics of
colonialism, the politics of' opening-up' andthe export of capital. The
development of capitalism has been possible only through constant
expansion into new domains of production and new countries. But the
global drive to expand leads to a collision between capital and precapitalist forms of society, resulting in violence, war, revol ution: in
brief, catastrophes from start to finish, the vital element of capitalism.
(Luxembrourg / Bukharin 1972, p. 145)
An early critic of the territorial logic:
Bukharin
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In his reply to Luxembourg Bukharin followed a twofold
strategy:
On the one hand he deconstructed the core of Luxembourg’s
argument insisting that expanded reproduction of capitalism
is contingent upon the dynamics of class struggle and it is
wrong to assume an absolute limit, as Luxembourg did.
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In other words: a conflict between production and consumption, or,
which amounts to the same thing, a general over-production, is
nothing other than a crisis. This position is basically different from
that held by Rosa Luxemburg, according to which over-production
must manifest itself at all times in a purely capitalist society, since
an expanded reproduction is absolutely) impossible. (Luxembourg /
Bukharin 1972, p. 225)
An early critic of the territorial logic:
Bukharin (II)
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On the other hand Bukharin insisted that the motive for capitalist expansion is not
realization of value, but the search for profit. This insistence on capitalist profit is an
important break with the logic of territorial expansion either as need for the
extraction of assets or as need for finding new outlets for inherent capitalist overproduction. According to Bukharin the driving force behind capital exports is not the
problem of realization (the basis of under-consumption theories) but the search for
higher profit rates and this can explain why imperialist policies are not directed
solely against the non-capitalist periphery but also against the capitalist centre and
he cites the French occupation of Ruhr as an example.
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The reader will have noticed how strangely Rosa Luxemburg formulates the question of the
economic roots of capital expansion. As she overlooks the factor of the search for larger
profits, she reduces everything to the bare formula of the possibility of realization. Why does
capital need a non-capitalist milieu? (Luxembourg / Bukharin 1972, p. 246)
The expansion of capital is conditioned by the movement of profit, its amount and rate, on
which the amount depends. The movement of commodities and capital follows the law of the
averaging out of the rate of profit. There is no doubt that this process must be seen from the
standpoint of the reproduction of the total social capital. (Luxembourg / Bukharin 1972, p.
255)
The specificity of imperialism
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Accordingly, the objective content of capital expansion changes also - within
certain limits. We saw that the forms of expansion changed towards a
sharpening of the methods of fighting. Further we have seen that this again is
caused by a change of the forms of capital itself. As war is nothing but 'the
continuation of politics with other means', so is politics nothing but the method
of the reproduction of certain conditions of production. So the modem
expansion of capital differs from the previous in the fact that it reproduces the
new historical type of the conditions of production on an extended level, i.e.
the type of the conditions of finance capitalism. In this rests the basic
constitutive characteristic of imperialism, which Rosa Luxemburg completely
overlooked. What is the point of all this talk about imperialism, if one does
not understand its specific historical characteristics? It means a
misunderstanding of the demands of Marxist methodology as well as of the
'concrete historical process', which is so often called as a witness against the
'soulless formulae' in Marx's Capital. (Luxembourg / Bukharin 1971, p. 257)
The wrong reading of Lenin
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There are two possible readings of Lenin’s theory of Imperialism.
One is to consider it a Marxist version of classical theories of
colonial empire-building, either those that related imperialism to an
overabundance of capital in tandem with growing social instability,
or those that considered imperialism an expression of certain
fractions of the ruling block that had to gain from overseas
expansion and military build up (Hobson 1902). According to this
view, Lenin presents a theory of irremediable capitalist stagnation
and overproduction which can only be temporarily dealt with by
colonization, the latter providing the necessary outlet for idle capital
and a means of social pacification, through the creation of a labour
aristocracy.
This is a wrong reading
The problems with Lenin (a)
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Lenin’s endorsement of Bukharin’s book on world capitalism (Lenin 1917). Bukharin,
although not a theorist of a global unified capitalist system in the strict sense,
tended to present an image of a global capitalism as an integral system in which
the antagonistic relations between big capitalist trusts represented by states, thus
underestimating specificity of the role of the state
At present, when the competition and the centralisation of capital are being
reproduced on a world scale, we find the same two types. When one country, one state
capitalist trust, absorbs another, a weaker one possessed of comparatively the same
economic structure, we have a horizontal centralisation of capital. Where, however, the
state capitalist trust includes an economically supplementary unit, an agrarian country
for instance, we have the formation of a combine. Substantially the same
contradictions and the same moving forces are reflected here as within the limits of
"national economies"; to be specific, the rise of prices of raw materials leads to the
rise of combined enterprises. Thus on the higher stage of the struggle there is
reproduced the same contradiction between the various branches, but on a
considerably wider scale. (Bukharin n.d., pp. 120-21)
The problems with Lenin (b)
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Lenin’s emphasis on the formation of monopolies as a
distinctive feature of the imperialist stage sometimes
underestimated competition between capitals.
But this is not the case. Not in every branch of industry
are there large-scale enterprises; and moreover, a very
important feature of capitalism in its highest stage of
development is so-called combination of production, that
is to say, the grouping in a single enterprise of different
branches of industry (Lenin v. 22, 198
The problems with Lenin (c)
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Lenin’s tendency towards an instrumentalist theory of the
state as a tool in the hands of monopoly capital and big
trusts.
His definition of imperialism (and monopoly capital) as
inherently parasitic and crisis-prone.
From all that has been said in this book on the economic essence of
imperialism, it follows that we must define it as capitalism in
transition, or, more precisely, as moribund capitalism. (Lenin, v.22,
p. 302)
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e) His agreement with Hilferding’s original position that the
export of capital towards the periphery was the result of
limits to capital accumulation in the imperialist centre and
with Hilferding’s conception of the predominance of
monopolies and cartels (Hilferding 1981).
Another reading of Lenin is possible!
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Lenin’s theory of imperialism revolutionizes the
theory of the international system, giving
imperialism a wholly different meaning than simple
empire building. Lenin tried to think of the
international system as a complex unity of
economic, social and political contradictions, as a
hierarchy of social formations, engaged not only in
economic competition, but also in political and
military antagonism.
Uneven development
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Uneven economic and political development is an absolute
law of capitalism. (Lenin, v.21, p. 342)
Uneven development is not just a description of the
world system. It is an acknowledgement of the constant
and overdetermined efficacy of class struggles. Global
tendencies, both economic and ‘geopolitical, are uneven
because class struggles and their dynamics are uneven.
See also his description of the antagonisms in the world
scene in the introductory speech at the Second Congress
of the Communist International (Lenin 1920a)
Uneven development and
overdetermination
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That the revolution succeeded so quickly and—seemingly, at the first
superficial glance—so radically, is only due to the fact that, as a result of an
extremely unique historical situation, absolutely dissimilar currents, absolutely
heterogeneous class interests, absolutely contrary political and social strivings
have merged, and in a strikingly “harmonious” manner. (Lenin vol. 23, p.
302)
As long as national and state distinctions exist among peoples and countries—
and these will continue to exist for a very long time to come, even after the
dictatorship of the proletariat has been established on a world-wide scale—
the unity of the international tactics of the communist working-class movement
in all countries demands, not the elimination of variety of the suppression of
national distinctions (which is a pipe dream at present), but an application of
the fundamental principles of communism (Soviet power and the dictatorship
of the proletariat), which will correctly modify these principles in certain
particulars, correctly adapt and apply them to national and national-state
distinctions. (Lenin vol. 31, p. 92)
Uneven development and
overdetermination (II)
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Uneven development is not merely about quantitative differences between social
formations but describes the necessarily singular and overdetermined character of
both
In the international plane, uneven development is the necessary outcome of the
complex history of the emergence and domination of capitalism in different parts of
the world. It refers to the consequent creation of antagonistic total social capitals,
and the fragmentation into different and mostly national polities. In this process,
different class histories led to different balances of forces between dominant and
subaltern classes (but also among power blocs), and consequently different paths
for state formation, and also domestic and international strategies.
Uneven development, and the different strategies for capital accumulation, not only
in terms of international market antagonism but also in terms of states promoting
the interests of antagonistic total social capitals and bourgeoisies, create the
material conditions for conflict. It is exactly this articulation of the economic and the
political, itself uneven, contradictory and contingent on the dynamics of the
conjuncture, that leads to inter-imperialist rivalry and war
Class relations determine international
relations
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The most important point in Lenin’s approach is that social relations take analytical
priority over inter-state relations. States’ behaviour on the international plane is
conditioned by their social structure and the balance of forces in the class struggle.
Imperialism is not the outcome of a simple drive towards territorial expansion, but
the result of specific tendencies in the development of capitalist accumulation
(relative surplus value as the predominant form of surplus extraction, real
subsumption of labour to capital, concentration and centralization of capital) and of
the contradictions that arise out of its class antagonistic nature.
That is why Lenin considers imperialism as a specific stage in the development of
capital. However reminiscent of an evolutionary theorization of capitalist
development this conception of stages can it be, it nevertheless has the advantage
of linking international behaviour to capitalist accumulation and class contradictions.
Moreover, for Lenin, internationalization of capital is not an expression of capitalist
stagnation, but an aggressive tendency helping the expanded reproduction of
capitalism, the consolidation of the ruling block, and the tentative dominant role of
capitalism over non-capitalist modes of production.
The specificity of capitalist imperialism
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The emphasis on class relations and antagonisms marks a sharp difference between Lenin’s
theory of imperialism and proponents of American expansionism in the form of ‘economic
imperialism’ as a solution for the over-abundance of capital, such as Charles Conant (1898).
Lenin’s intervention goes far beyond a theory of idle capitals, the difficulty of wealth
redistribution and the unavailability of domestic productive outlets. The fundamental issue for
Lenin was not capital exports as such, but capital exports as part of a broader tendency: the
expansion of capitalist social relations on a global scale, the political and military antagonisms
that followed this expansion, the violent character of this process, and the resulting challenges
for the revolutionary movement.
Beginning with his early work on the development of capitalism in Russia (Lenin 1977) Lenin
insisted on capitalism transforming all social forms it gets into contact with. Although Lenin
lacked a theory of the articulation of modes of production that could help explain the
symbiotic relation of capitalism with many non-capitalist modes of exploitation, we think that
he managed to grasp the particular way capitalism may emerge within specific conjunctures
not simply as a dominant mode of production, but as the central node around which other
modes and forms of production can be articulated.
Such a conception of capitalist imperialism can explain why especially during colonial
expansion forms of capitalist and non-capitalist exploitation could co-exist, co-emerge and
even co-develop.
Capitalist Imperialism
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“Imperialism, in turn, is the set of conditions that shape and
are shaped by the existence of this exploitation. Yes
capitalist imperialism – not because capitalists get what they
want, nor because forms of colonial expansion and
domination did not predate the emergence and
development of capitalism, nor finally because imperialism
can be reduced to or explained entirely in terms of the
economy (capitalist or otherwise) – but because the
particular forms of imperialism I am referring to, from the
British annexation of India to the US military barrage on
Iraqi forces and the new ‘war on terrorism’ cannot be
divorced from those (complex, changing) conditions and
effects of capitalism to which I just referred.” (Ruccio 2003,
87).
Lenin’s theoretical revolution
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Lenin revolutionized the theorization of the international
system by giving internal class relations and
contradictions analytical priority over interstate
relations. Contrary to most theories of international
relations, both realist and ‘idealist’, which have their
origins in classical political philosophy and 19th century
diplomatic history and tend to view states as subjects
that act out of their own will, Lenin insisted that the
policies of states are governed by their internal class
balance of forces, the degree of capitalist development
and the particular class strategies around it.
Export of capitals
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Typical of the old capitalism, when free competition held undivided sway, was the export of
goods. Typical of the latest stage of capitalism, when monopolies rule, is the export of capital.
(Lenin, v. 22, p. 240)
The export of capital influences and greatly accelerates the development of capitalism in those
countries to which it is exported. While, therefore, the export of capital may tend to a certain
extent to arrest development in the capital exporting countries, it can only do so by expanding
and deepening the further development of capitalism throughout the world. (Lenin, v.22, p. 243
Lenin’s emphasis on capital exports – not simply as productive investments abroad but as the
expansion of capitalist social relations – as the predominant form of the internationalization of
capital, and on the internationalization of capital as the material basis of imperialism also
had revolutionizing effects. Contrary to the traditional conception of international power
politics as expressions of conflicting national interests, Lenin insisted on the internationalization
of capital as a contradictory expansion of capitalist social relations resulting to singular
articulations of capitalist and non capitalist modes and forms of production, but with capitalist
social forms being dominant not necessarily quantitatively but surely qualitatively in the sense
of inducing the transformation of all social relations and practices. International conflicts must
be viewed as class antagonisms mediated by the nation-states as expressions of the long-term
interest of the power blocs in these states, namely alliances of the dominant classes, in which
capitalist classes play a leading role.
Internationalization of capital Vs
territorial expansion
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Lenin’s emphasis on the internationalization of capital
through capital exports dealt a decisive blow to the notion
of imperialism as simply territorial expansion. Despite
Lenin’s many references to the ‘division of the world among
the Great Powers’, the core of his argument regarding
capital exports is that the expansion of capital no longer
requires territorial annexation or formal empire, but the
articulation of capital accumulation and political power.
Moreover, his insistence on antagonism and conflict and on
the particular, non-uniform and related to a given
conjuncture dynamics of interimperialist rivalry prevent his
position from falling into the teleology of a uniform
transition and development.
A political theory of imperialism
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Lenin’s emphasis on the role of states in imperialist dynamics and rivalries and on
the necessity of the state apparatuses for the expression and mediation of capitalist
interests in the international system, leads also to a political theory of imperialism.
Imperialism presupposes political power as a condensation of class interests and
inter-imperialist rivalries are political rivalries, struggles between different power
blocks, including struggles between alliances of states, something that can also
account for the importance of international organizations.
This emphasis on the relative autonomy of the political protects Lenin’s argument
from economistic reductionism and keeps capital accumulation and capitalist class
interests as the necessary material ground of the whole process. That is why Lenin
proposed a possible explanation for World War I as the culmination of rival
strategies for leadership and dominance in the imperialist system.
It can also explain the possibility that the international is also the plane where
internal contradictions and political strategies are being played out, from the many
examples of aggressive military campaigns to galvanize domestic consent in
nationalist lines, to the current use of international economic organizations such as
the IMF to promote political agendas that were initially domestically articulated.
Imperialist chain
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The emergence of the concept of the imperialist chain as the suitable
description of the hierarchal, uneven and contradictory character of
the international system, and of the combination of hierarchy and
interdependence in the international plane and the concept of
weakest link as an attempt to describe the potential condensation of
contradictions in a specific social formation, are also important.
Class struggle within each social formation determines its position in
the hierarchy of the imperialist chain.
The form of social alliances, the stage of capitalist development, the
level of capitalist productivity, its military and political force, as well
as its ideological influence, can reinforce or undermine the relative
international power of a capitalist social formation.
A social formation’s position in the imperialist chain is not based only
on its level of economic development but also on the entirety of its
political and military power.
Antagonism in the imperialist chain
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the fact that the world is already partitioned obliges those
contemplating a redivision to reach out for every kind of territory, and
(2) an essential feature of imperialism is the rivalry between several
great powers in the striving for hegemony, i.e., for the conquest of
territory, not so much directly for themselves as to weaken the
adversary and undermine his hegemony. (Lenin, v.22, 269)
The new index of the power of politics which characterizes monopoly
capitalism within each national formation is translated into the new
index of the power of politics which marks international relations in
the imperialist stage. […] The concrete form and the degreee of the
strength of politics within each national formation, depend on its
‘historical position as a link in the chain: this depends in turn on the
uneven development of the chain and on its mode of existence within
each link (Poulantzas 1979 p. 24)
The weak link of the chain
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The theory of the imperialist chain along with the
imagery of the weakest link in the chain remain
important for any thinking of revolutionary politics
It describes the complex articulation of national and
international determinations and the
overdetermination of class antagonism
It offers the possibility of a theory of the
revolutionary conjuncture, a theory the the
‘moment’(and not of the event)
An Althusserian detour
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Lenin gave this metaphor above all a practical
meaning. A chain is as strong as its weakest link. In
general, anyone who wants to control a given situation
will look out for a weak point, in case it should render
the whole system vulnerable. On the other hand, anyone
who wants to attack it, even if the odds are apparently
against him, need only discover this one weakness to
make all its power precarious. ”
“
Althusserian detour (II)

But here we should pay careful attention: if it is obvious that the theory of the weakest link
guided Lenin in his theory of the revolutionary party (it was to be faultlessly united in
consciousness and organization to avoid adverse exposure and to destroy the enemy), it was also
the inspiration for his reflections on the revolution itself. How was this revolution possible in Russia,
why was it victorious there? It was possible in Russia for a reason that went beyond Russia:
because with the unleashing of imperialist war humanity entered into an objectively
revolutionary situation.Imperialism tore off the 'peaceful' mask of the old capitalism. The
concentration of industrial monopolies, their subordination to financial monopolies, had increased
the exploitation of the workers and of the colonies. Competition between the monopolies made
war inevitable. But this same war, which dragged vast masses, even colonial peoples from whom
troops were drawn, into limitless suffering, drove its cannon-fodder not only into massacres, but
also into history. Everywhere the experience, the horrors of war, were a revelation and
confirmation of a whole century's protest against capitalist exploitation; a focusing-point, too, for
hand in hand with this shattering exposure went the effective means of action. […] Why this
paradoxical exception? For this basic reason: in the 'system of imperialist states'[8] Russia
represented the weakest point. The Great War had, of course, precipitated and aggravated this
weakness, but it had not by itself created it. Already, even in defeat, the 1905 Revolution had
demonstrated and measured the weakness of Tsarist Russia. This weakness was the product of this
special feature: the accumulation and exacerbation of all the historical contradictions
Marxism and the Political
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In contrast to the tautologies used in traditional political science, in which political power is just
taken as given, Marxism offers a definition of power as the “capacity of a social class to
realize its specific objective interests” (Poulantzas 1978, 104).
This priority of exploitation over domination offers an explanation of power as class power,
ability of social groups to control the extraction and distribution of surplus labour because of
their specific objective structural class position. It offers a possible explanation of the class
character of power relations and struggles and therefore also of state apparatuses.
The key point, in our opinion, is to stress at the same time the analytical priority of exploitation
over repression and domination, and the importance of the fact that political practice has as
its object the condensation of all the contradictions of the various levels of a social formation
(Poulantzas 1978, 41).
This notion of the political escapes the shortcomings of both the mainstream political science’s
notion of political power as administrative command, and of the portrayal of political power
as direct control of the state by capitalist factions that characterizes many varieties of
economistic Marxism.
In this non-economistic reading of Marxism, the insistence on the class character of political
power is combined with the position that class strategies are also necessarily political
strategies, strategies aimed at reproducing or destabilizing social formations as complex and
contradictory unities of economic, political, ideological relations and practises.
The dialectic of the economic and the
political



we can accept both Marx’s insistence that the “specific
economic form, in which unpaid surplus-labour is
pumped out of direct producers” is the “innermost
secret” of every social structure (Marx 1894, 778)
and Althusser’s warning that although the economic
relations are determinant in the last instance, the “lonely
hour of the ‘last instance’ never comes” (Althusser 1969,
113).
It is a conception of political power that manages to
maintain the link between politics and the economy and
at the same time ground the necessary relative
autonomy of the political
[Marx]

The specific economic form, in which unpaid surplus-labour is pumped out of direct
producers, determines the relationship of rulers and ruled, as it grows directly out of
production itself and, in turn, reacts upon it as a determining element. Upon this,
however, is founded the entire formation of the economic community which grows up
out of the production relations themselves, thereby simultaneously its specific
political form. It is always the direct relationship of the owners of the conditions of
production to the direct producers — a relation always naturally corresponding to a
definite stage in the development of the methods of labour and thereby its social
productivity — which reveals the innermost secret, the hidden basis of the entire
social structure and with it the political form of the relation of sovereignty and
dependence, in short, the corresponding specific form of the state. This does not
prevent the same economic basis — the same from the standpoint of its main
conditions — due to innumerable different empirical circumstances, natural
environment, racial relations, external historical influences, etc. from showing infinite
variations and gradations in appearance, which can be ascertained only by
analysis of the empirically given circumstances. (Marx 1894, 778)
[Althusser]

We must carry this through to its conclusion and say that this
overdetermination does not just refer to apparently unique and
aberrant historical situations (Germany, for example), but is universal
; the economic dialectic is never active in the pure state ; in History,
these instances, the superstructures, etc. -- are never seen to step
respectfully aside when their work is done or, when the Time comes,
as his pure phenomena, to scatter before His Majesty the Economy
as he strides along the royal road of the Dialectic. From the first
moment to the last, the lonely hour of the 'last instance' never comes.
(Althusser 1969, 113)
Gramsci and Hegemony
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
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
To this we must add the importance and theoretical fruitfulness of the Gramscian concept of
Hegemony (Gramsci 1971; Buci-Glucksmann 1980; Bootham 2008; Thomas 2009).
Itdoes not simply imply the combination of coercion and consent. Rather, it refers to the
complex modalities of social and political power in capitalist societies that make a social class
become the leading social force in a society.
Moreover, the concepts of hegemony and hegemonic apparatus, as part of Gramsci’s
theorization of the Integral State (Gramsci 1971, 239; Thomas 2009, 137-141) also offer a
way to theorize the extent and complexity of State apparatuses and their economic, political,
and ideological practices and interventions.
Along with Althusser’s conception of the Ideological State Apparatuses (Althusser 1971;
Althusser 1995) and their role in social reproduction and Poulantzas’ relational conception of
the State as a condensation of social forces (Poulantzas 1980), this theoretical direction
maintains the relation between State functioning and social class formations, brings forward
the role of the State in the elaboration of class strategies and the transformation of class
interests into political projects, and stresses how the State is being traversed and conditioned
by class struggles and antagonisms.
States are not self-sufficient forces (the
limits of geopolitics)



We cannot take states as self-sufficient actors in shaping the international
plane, but we must look at the different class alliances and power blocs and
how these affect the formation of capitalist class strategy, state policy and
consequently international policy.
States’ behaviour in the international plane is itself conditioned by the
articulation of class contradictions and political strategies and the
emergence of hegemonic power blocs. Interstate relations can be viewed as
class based relations, as relations (and conflicts) between different power
blocs.
The current return of ‘geopolitics’ is a welcome refusal of the economistic
idealism of the ‘globalization’ rhetoric. However, it poses the danger of a
return to a pre-Marxist conception of political power. Of course, if
‘geopolitics’ is a metonymic reference to the State’s relative autonomy vis-àvis the economy or the relative autonomy of the political in general, then we
do not disagree in principle, but we still insist on a terminology that
underlines the conceptual break between Marxist and non-Marxist theories
of Imperialism.
Imperialism as a class strategy


Imperialism as class political strategy in an inherently antagonistic international
plane, where the antagonism between capitals is also mediated through the
antagonism of power blocs and where States as potential representatives of
collective capitalist interests constantly intervene, by economic, ideological, political
and military means, in order not simply to promote specific capitalist interests but
also the more general conditions for capitalist accumulation through strategies that
are also over-determined by political and ideological considerations having to do
with their specific class balance of forces and the articulation of modes and forms
of production.
This is the problem with the territorial or geopolitical logic expressed in many recent
interventions. It is not that capitalists and capitalist states do not preoccupy
themselves with territorial or spatial questions (for example natural resources) or
with geopolitical questions (for example regional military balance of forces), but
that this is not the basic ‘logic’ of capitalist imperialism. But to substantiate this
position and to distance it from a teleological or deterministic conception we will
proceed, in the next section, to an alternative theorization of capitalist imperialism.
The non-territorial logic of capitalist
imperialism




Direct territorial domination and expansion is a characteristic, in particular in Europe, of precapitalist modes of production where direct access and possession of land and scarce
resources and the ability to exercise direct physical force on populations in order to extract
surpluses (‘extra-economic’ coercion) were structural aspects of social reproduction.
The emergence of capitalism as a dominant mode of production, and of an international
system based on territorially sovereign nation-states, the evolution of social and political
struggles, and the growing importance of productivity, technological change, and real
subsumption of labour, meant that territorial gains of colonial dominions were no longer
essential conditions for the reproduction of the system.
On the contrary what emerges as the main aspect of modern capitalist imperialism is the
internationalization of capital. By internationalization we refer to all forms of product and
capital exports, of capital movements, of trade and financial transactions, of global relocation
of production, of lowering of barriers to trade and investment, of international agreements,
policy initiatives and organizations facilitating theses procedures, including forms of
international coordination and even creation of forms of supranational integration such as the
EU.
The internationalization of capital is indeed inducing the expansion of specifically capitalist
social relations of production, in articulation with non-capitalist modes and forms of production
in complex processes of reproduction and transformation.
The political dimension of the
internationalization of capital




The tendency of capital to transcend national borders and search all
over the world for better profitability is not an unmediated purely
economic process.
If political power and bourgeois hegemony are necessary conditions
for the reproduction of capitalist social relations, the same goes for
the internationalization of capital: some form of political intervention
(and ideological legitimization) is necessary for it.
This is a structural necessity; the specific form of this political and
ideological guarantee is subject to historical contingencies,
This can explain the move from imperialism in the form of rival
colonial empires to the more ‘modern’ imperialism of a hierarchy of
imperialist formations, with the US in the hegemonic role of
politically and militarily guaranteeing the global collective capitalist
interest.
Competition and politics



Competition between capitals is an “organic” aspect of capitalism, in the sense that it is
inscribed in the very structure of the capitalist market. However, competition between
different capitals in the international plane takes the form not only of competition
between different national capitals but also to competition and antagonism between
different states representing different collective capitalist interests. That is why the notion
of the imperialist chain is still an accurate description of the uneven and complex
relations of interdependence between different social formations and power blocks.
When we talk about political intervention as a prerequisite for the internationalization
of capital we do not refer only to ‘classical’ forms of military intervention or ‘gunboat
diplomacy’. For example, the formation of the current international financial architecture
was not just a spontaneous process and same goes for the lowering of barriers to the
free flow of products and capital and the political decision to expose capitalist social
formations to the competitive pressure of world markets and capital movements.
Etienne Balibar suggested that Marx performs a theoretical short circuit between
economics and politics, by grounding the political in class strategies within production and
at the same time treating the economical as a terrain of conflicting political class
strategies. A theory of imperialism must perform the same theoretical short circuit.
On the causes of war

In this light, we must tackle the question of the causes of war. If one sees war,
especially imperialist war, as a form of territorial expansion, then the evolution of
capitalism and the importance of capital exports make this sort of expansion (and
any military preparation for it) unnecessary. But one should not forget that two
World Wars were mainly not the outcome of territorial disputes. It is true that the
question of the dissolution of Empires acted as a catalyst for WWI, and one should
not underestimate the initial importance of Nazi Germany’s claim over all of the
territories with German-speaking minorities in the outbreak of WWII. But it is also
obvious that in both World Wars the scale of the mobilization and the extent of the
conflict were beyond simple territorial claims. It was a fight for leadership and
hegemony in the capitalist world. These wars were mainly forms of escalating
political antagonism, due to condensed contradictions concerning the hegemonic
position in the imperialist chain. If one sees war as an extreme case of political
confrontation, then we can insist on the position that antagonism remains the
structural aspect of interstate relations. Whether this antagonism takes the form of
military confrontation or remains in political terms (namely within the limits of current
international law and custom) depends on the conjuncture, on the scale of the
interests and strategies at stake, on the balance of forces both regionally and
globally, on the domestic social and political configuration and whether war effort
will galvanize or destabilize hegemony.
Transnational Classes and States



Most ‘globalization’ theories are either simple
descriptions of tendencies and o observable
phenomena, lacking theoretical rigour
Other theories, such as the one presented in Empire
(Hardt – Negri 2000) are simple metaphorical
rewritings of traditional global capitalism theories
The most interesting theories are the one suggesting
that we are dealing with transnational capitals,
transnational social formations and transnational
political forms, such as the theory presented by
William I. Robinson.
Are there transnational classes?



‘globalization is establishing the material conditions for the rise of a
bourgeoisie whose coordinates are no longer national. In this process of
transnational class formation dominant groups fuse into a class (or class
fraction) within transnational space. The organic composition, objective
position and subjective constitution of these groups are no longer tied to
nation-states.’ (Robinson and Harris 2000)
“The national state is being transformed and increasingly absorbed
functionally into a larger transnational institutional structure that involves
complex new relations between national states and supra or transnational
institutions, on the one hand, and diverse class and social forces, on the other.”
(Robinson 2007, p. 17)
We are witness to new forms of global capitalist domination, whereby
intervention is intended to create conditions favorable to the penetration of
transnational capital and the renewed integration of the intervened region
into the global system. Robinson 2007, p. 19)
The limits of Empire



Hardt and Negri in Empire (2000) in fact, despite
the references to biopolitics etc, in fact return to a
very classical conception of a global capitalism
system, in certain aspects reminiscent of
Luxembourg’s positions
Their reference to Empire has the extra problem of
confusing the capitalist and pre-capitalist
conception of empire
Consequently it is more a radical theory of
globalization rather than a Marxist theory of
imperialism
The limits of globalization




However, there is a problem with thinking in terms of
transnational class formations
On the one hand the reproduction of the subaltern classes is
not ‘transnational’. There is no transnational proletariat, nor
can we treat migration as an expression of some nation-less
nomadic ‘multitude’. In contrast, the working classes are still
reproduced at the national level.
There are no transnational bourgeoisies. All ‘transnational’
corporations always rely on the support of the country of
origin
Even the most aggressive attempts towards ‘supra-national’
political arrangements, such as the EU, are not ‘supra-states’
despite the ceding of aspects of sovereignty.
Rethinking hegemony




Can the role of the US be described as simply world dominance or power supremacy, through
the use of force and the ability to guaranty trade and capital flows and have access to
contested territories and scarce resources?
Such a view regresses to a more traditionally Realist view of international relations and a
more territorial logic of interstate relations. Moreover, the Hobbesian view of power
antagonism between self-sufficient and ‘selfish’ agents that characterizes Realism is
inadequate to theorize the complex dialectic of competition and cooperation, antagonism and
interdependence, conflict and alliance building in the international system.
The US has not been simply imposing its will on unwilling subjects (despite the occasional twist
of arms) but manages (at least up to now) to assume a position of leadership in what is at the
same time a terrain of antagonisms and an imperialist block. What can be described as the
more ‘geopolitical’ moment of current imperialism, namely the safeguarding of the flow of oil
towards the West, cannot be theorized iwn territorial terms, since the aim of the current
American military interventionism in the Middle East is performed in the name of the collective
interest of the capitalist world to have access to energy resources, and not in the name of
direct American colonization.
This notion of hegemony in the imperialist chain should not be seen as an altruistic attitude.
Rather, it refers to those historically specific conjunctures when fulfilling the prerequisites for the
long-term interest of the ruling bloc of the leading imperialist formation also induces the
safeguarding of certain of the class interests of the ruling classes in the other formations in the
imperialist chain.
The dialectics of hegemony



Hegemony presents political power and class domination as the
dialectic of direction, coercion and consent and offers a wider sense
of class antagonisms and political struggles that goes beyond both
realist cynicism and idealistic legalism.
Hegemony, in this view, comprises political direction, social class
alliance building, social political and military repression, ideological
misrecognition and material concessions.
Hegemony is not simply coercion plus legitimization, but an attempt
to theorize the complexity of class antagonism and political power,
thus offering a better description both of social antagonism and of
the hierarchies arising in the international plane. Moreover, since
hegemony refers to a power relation and consequently entails
conflict and antagonism.
Hegemony in the imperialist chain



If the notion of the imperialist chain is accurate as a description of
the contradictory, hierarchical, uneven and interdependent character
of an international system based upon the enlarged reproduction of
capitalist social relations in nation-states, the notion of hegemony
can help explain the mechanisms of leadership in the imperialist
chain.
The leading social formation is not just the more powerful
economically or politico-militarily; above all it must be able to offer
plausible strategies for the collective capital interest of the whole
imperialist chain.
Hegemony can account for the dialectic between antagonism and
hierarchy better than traditional power-politics approaches that can
account only for contingent balance of force hierarchies, but not for
cases of strategic political and ‘moral’ leadership.
Inter-imperialist rivalry as struggle
for hegemony



In this sense current developments are not simply
about geopolitics or ‘open markets’ or access to
natural resources, however important these aspects
are
The question is what are the hegemonic project
arising
The new hegemon for the 21st century will not be
simply the most powerful military force, but the
country that will articulate the dominant narrative
American Hegemony
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

American foreign policy after 1945 aimed not only at guarantying
American supremacy but also at offering elements of a collective strategy
for the whole imperialist chain (rapid industrialization, ‘fordist’ accumulation
strategies, mass consumerism and individualism, a combination between
anti-communism and technocratic ideology).
Even the most openly ‘geopolitical’ forms of American political and military
interventions, which can indeed be used as an illustration of an attempt
towards world domination, such as the extended network of military bases,
Air-Force bases and CIA stations, can be best interpretated by reference to
a hegemonic strategy.
They are not imperial outposts, but mainly make manifest to ability of the
US to militarily guarantee capitalist social order all over the world.
American political and military intervention during the past 60 years did
not aim solely at guaranteeing American interests, nor did they aimed at
creating colonies, but at safeguarding the reproduction of capitalist social
relations, bourgeois rule and capitalist accumulation.
American Hegemony challenged

This complexity of hegemony in the imperialist chain means that we
should always be very careful when talking about imperial decline.
Crisis of hegemony cannot be a simple factor process. In the 1970s
the US suffered actual military defeats in South-east Asia, capital
over-accumulation, fiscal crisis, and the economic challenge posed by
Japan and West Germany. Yet the US not only managed to retain
global leadership but also to eventually offer in the 1980s and
1990s an hegemonic strategy that combined neoliberalism, capitalist
restructuring, the intensification of the internationalization of capital
and the lowering of barriers to the free flow of capitals and
products, the incorporation in the imperialist chain of former socialist
formations, the authoritarian backlash against labour, and a more
aggressive form of imperialist interventionism. In this sense, the
current conjuncture of a global capitalist crisis surely poses a test
and challenge for US hegemony but should not be considered as
automatically leading to imperial decline.
Inter-imperialist rivalry as struggle
for hegemony
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American strategy still a combination between opening up of markets,
securing access to resources (for the entire imperialist chain) and military
interventionism
It also includes ‘managed of destabilization’ and use of crisis escalation as
part of a strategy to pre-empt the emergence of other poles (Ukraine
offers an example)
At the same time Quantitative Easing etc attempt at guaranteeing the
global economy against the crisis (in contrast to German-inspired austerity)
Re-establishment of ‘euroatlantic’ axis after 2003 and TTIP negotiations
strengthen American position
However, open question whether other poles of accumulation that have
emerged can recognize themselves within American Hegemony
The rise of China?



In this sense it is an open question whether the
increased economic and political role of China (in its
alliance also to a certain extent with Russia) will be
transformed into a challenge for hegemony
This hasn’t got to do only with increased economic,
technological, military power
It will have to do with the possibility to articulate a
different narrative and in particularly with the
ability to enforce and safeguard it.
The EU as form of modern
imperialism
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
A theory of imperialism can help us understand the process of EU
integration.
Expression of increased internationalization of capital
Most advanced case of voluntary ceding of aspects sovereignty
(such as currency) and of imposing forms of supra-national economic
governance
Use of reduced sovereignty and EU institutions ‘constitutionalism
without popular sovereignty’ as means to aggressively make
neoliberalism and capitalist restructuring irreversible
At the same time Eurozone architecture inherently unequal –
expressed in the German growth at the expense of European
periphery
Contradictions of European
Integration

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

Current crisis in the architecture exactly the result of
EU not being a supra-state: inability to counter
regional imbalances, economic, political and cultural
barriers to full mobility, impossibility of it ever
becoming an ‘optimum currency area’
Reduced sovereignty without solidarity
Crisis of the Euro
Social and Political crisis, crisis of Hegemony.
A strategy of rupture





All major aspects of Eurozone and EU monetary, financial and
institutional architecture, suggest that attempts towards ‘reform
from inside’ will fail
Embedded neoliberalism + structural democratic deficit lead
to major legitimacy crisis of ‘European’ Project
Negri and Mezzandra position regarding Integration as ‘‘well
beyond the threshold of irreversibility’ is off the mark
Inability of EU Left to stand up to the challenge leaves space
open for Far-Right ‘euroscepticism’
A strategy of rupture more necessary than ever
Left ‘euroscepticism’ not chauvinist




Necessary measures such as correcting the exchange rate are about protecting
Greek society from the systemic violence inherent in international capital and
commodity flows.
Single currency always leads to real wage reductions, austerity measures,
privatisations and constant pressure for neoliberal reforms in the name of
responding to competitive pressures.
Exiting such monetary configurations is not a strategy for ‘isolation’, but a necessary
defence against aggressive capitalist policies.
Moreover, it would a mistake to accept, in the name of ‘internationalism’, the current
form of capitalist internationalization of production, where a product has to travel
around the world, go through ‘social dumping’ areas and ‘special economic zones’
and have a negative environmental impact, in order to arrive to our market place.
Aren’t locality, environmental protection, relative self-sufficiency, crucial aspects of
any potential anti-capitalist alternative?
Anti-imperialism as
(counter)hegemony




Resistance to imperialism today not simply about
‘independence’ or ‘delinking’ from
internationalization of capital
It is also about rethinking the possibility of workingclass hegemony as part of a new historical bloc of
the subaltern class
This can also imply a different articulation of
relations of (counter)hegemony at the international
level: solidarity, struggle, ‘diplomacy of movements’
We urgently need to reopen the debate!
To conclude!



From the fight against war, military interventionism
and the ‘counter-terrorist’ undermining of democratic
freedoms to the struggle against the systemic social
violence of the internationalization of capital and
austerity, we confront contemporary imperialism in all
its forms
It is imperative that we fight against imperialism and
the capitalist social relations that give rise to it
The fight is far from over!