T1-lec4-essayoct28-2013
Acronyms:
EOP: The End of Poverty?...
NIS: Nectar in a Sieve
WST: World System Theory
ODL/NDL: Old and New Division of Labour
WMB: While Man’s Burden
TWCs: Third World Countries
SV: Structural Violence
SAP: Structural Adjustment Programme
WC: Washington Consensus
MNC: Multinational Corporation
Essay topic: Applying the World Systems Theory, compare the causes of Rukmani’s
poverty in Nectar in a Sieve with the causes of poverty of those in the Third World
countries as presented in the DVD: The End of Poverty? Think Again.
Build a comparative framework using all of the following themes and concepts.
Illustrate each concept with examples from the book and the DVD:
1. Power: Colonialism vs. Neoliberalism
2. Technology of Control: Factory vs. Structural Violence
3. Labour & Unequal exchange: Subsistence vs. Export production
4. ‘White Man’s Burden’ (WMB) & religion: Missionary vs. the Bible/ Church
Integration into the world system: Power; Technology; Labour: (cont’d):
Power: (two periods: colonial, neoliberal)
• Colonial: Core’s imperialism (total political control)
• Neoliberal: Core’s market control of capital
Technology of Control: Factory vs. WC & SV
• Colonial extraction for mother countries’ industrialization
• Corporate global oligopoly for capital accumulation/investment
Labour: ODL (colonial) and NDL (neoliberal)
• A single division of labor within one world market: Core controls
capital and Peripheries supply cheap labour and raw materials
North-South global Integration into the world system as Core-periphery: Power;
Technology; Labour; WMB.
• Core countries:
• P: Hegemony by military power
• T: Industrial mass production
• U: Appropriate much of the surplus of the whole
world-economy
• DL: Concentrate on higher-skill, capital-intensive
production
• Peripheral countries:
• P: powerless & poor economies
• U: market-imposed low trading value & cheap labour
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• DL: focus on low-skill, labor-intensive production
and extraction of raw materials
Thesis: (1st example)
• WST explains that from colonial times, Core’s imperialism and neoliberalism
have globally integrated their colonies as peripheries.
• The Core did this through the world market strategies of ODL/NDL, superior
technologies and unequal exchange. In this context, Core’s missionary and
the church attribute TWC’s lack of development to their attitudes that reject
capitalist self-interest.
• This view reinforces the Core’s cultural domination through the ideology of
‘the White Man’s Burden’ (WMB).
(WST: PUT-NDL)
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KbS1VkX3CP0 8.5 min WST explained (see it
later)
Thesis: (2nd example)
• WST argues that colonialism and neoliberalism intrude into the economies of
the TWCs, maintain the core countries’ power over the peripheries.
• The core countries integrate the TWCs into the world-system through their
control over the world market using DL, unequal exchange and superior
technology.
• The core countries justify this process espousing the ideologies of WMB.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LRZnEBFYNS0 2.3 min EOP trailer and WST
explanation of poverty
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Yl2ozDglFfg 36 sec have we made it? EOP
Use concepts given:
• NIS: Colonial power imposes capitalism on a subsistence economy.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Duxkrv4fSe4 (p1) 6.5min capitalism –
Brendan Mcoony
Intrusion of a factory commodifies the land and turns unemployed tenant farmers as
cheap labour. The factory is imposed on Rukmani’s village as a superior technology
symbolizing the superiority of the Western values.
•
EOP: Neoliberalist policies of WB & IMF: SAP & WC, advance the Cores’
political and corporate interests. These policies advance core’s control of
TWCs’ resources for export production. They ensure their profit
accumulation by resorting to strategies of structural violence and religious
manipulation to control the poor from rising against economic and social
inequities in the post-colonial era.
Hypothesis 1: Power: Impact of the Core’s world market hegemony on India & TWCs
Hypothesis 2: Technology: Cr controls the political and economic power &
superior technologies to make decisions on Peri.’s land and resources. In Peri.,
control of resources shifts from the community to the market.
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Hypothesis 3: Labour: Through ODL & NDL, Cr’s capital indebts and exploits Peri’s
cheap labour to enhance its capital accumulation.
Hypothesis 4: The Ideology of the “Whiteman’s Burden” (a blend of
colonial/neoliberal power & religious ideology) discredits TWC’s local values as
reasons for their poverty.
Core’s
Power
India under Colonial
capitalism (NIS)
Power:
Technolo
gy:
Manual
&
Machine
Total
Colonial
Control
Labour:
(ODL
& Debt)
Subsiste
nce &
Waged
Third World &
Neoliberalism (EOP)
WMB :
Missiona
ry&
Westerni
zation
path
Technol
ogy:
Advanc
ed
Industri
al
Labour:
Power of
control:
Structural
Violence
(NDL&
U)
Cheap or
Slave
workers in
Export
Productio
n
WMB:
The
Bible &
Mental
Coloniz
ation
Hypothesis 1: Power:
NIS: Impact of the Core’s world market hegemony on India was under colonialism.
EOP: During post-colonial period, Core’s neoliberal policies enforces its market
dominance through its monopolistic or oligopolistic corporations.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WwuJwLg4XLk monopoly-overview 8 min
(See this yourself)
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4-RfPMTk70Y monopoly Flasheconomics 2.33
min
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=At22KFhPcQY oligopoly 2min
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oS2NErFQ9Rk Apple monopolies: economics
video 1.5min
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=r6Rmy_nKEtI 2.3 min
Caller: Why Does Thom Think Wal-Mart is a Monopoly?
Comparison using the concept of power:
1. Power: Colonial vs. Neoliberal
NIS – colonial power’s total control – capitalist firm- investment in leather –raw
material extraction- industrializing a feudal subsistence economy – dismantled the
existing land system- tenants who work grow crops lose their land - the poor lose
access to village common land and water.
3
EOP: Post-colonial shape of power- Core’s neoliberal policies- Corporate capitalismMNC’s oligopolistic exploitation of TWC’s resources – unequal trade.
Hypothesis 1
Core’s Hegemony
impact of world
market on India
Tannery
intrudes
Disintegrates
community
impact of world
market on TWCs
First stage
of
integration
AICs’
corporate
capital
Tightens
market
integration
Appropriatio
n of TWCs’
land &
subterranean
resources
The Core (AICs) dominates the development and transactions of the world market :
World Market transactions:
• Commodity & financial instruments traded globally
• International trade based on power bargaining
• Global financial crisis since 1990s
Core’s (AICs’) power advances from colonial capitalism to corporate capitalism
through the development of the world market :
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fFa3YfWBCrg 0.47 sec Toussaint on begin.colonialism
16th –mid 20th C: Colonial capitalism in Nectar in a sieve
Mid-20th C on: Corporate capitalism in End of Poverty?... (EOP)
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WDIvkTIieHo 8min hoolahoop how monop is
created
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aaepg5HQGlw corp welfare 7 min tax evasion
Two stages of capitalist market integration & control:
1. Colonial: (16th C -20th C): Imperial power of the colonizing states profit from
selling colonial countries’ commodities in the world Market, e.g.:
• Rukmani’s village becomes a target
for raw materials for the world market
2. Post-colonial: Neoliberal policies: SAP (BLeeDS) & WC (LAPDog), facilitate MNCs
oligopolistic or monopolistic corporate capital to acquire TWCs’ resources for Core’s
capital accumulation e.g., http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rFL3GY0RU88 debt
susan george 1 min
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•
Core transfers surplus from unequal exchange of trade and
thus create TWC’s debt; Core supports MNCs monopolistic
control over, and extraction of subterranean resources of
TWCs
Impact of the Core’s world market hegemony on India & TWCs
India: Colonial control
1. British colonial capital: market (factory: tannery) power intrudes into
Rukmani’s village (26)
2. Disintegrates the community (46-47)
3. First stage of integration into the world system.
TWCs: Neoliberal policies: SAP & WC:
1. Colonial land tax, MNCs’ appropriation of common land belonging to
the rural poor, resource mining (Bolivia), Dutch in Asia. MNC’s
corporate capital:
2. Export production, e.g., Bolivia’s drinkable water (Bechtel)
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fFa3YfWBCrg (EOP Toussaint
clip on conquest)
3. Kenya's subsistence land & the Yala dam (Dominion); Subsistence
land lost due to Venezuelan govts’(replace what was grown with
imports), & Brazilian govts’ (South produces cheaper goods for the
North) export policies:
4. Trade (subsidy to AIC), debt & MNCs’ monopoly over resources
tightens the TWCs’ integration into the global market
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JOVW8qVpEOU Stiglitz on
subsidy and lower income for farmers
o Debt: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_PnQdu16RAA
sheen on debt etc
Power of Colonial capital & Evolution of capitalism: (“Nectar …” ).
• Colonial trade & Mercantile capital
(Merchantile capital)
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9W4e_rN15xA mercantilism 8 min
• Peri.’s Labour moves to Cr’s capital
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dnV_MTFEGIY The Atlantic Slave Trade:
Crash Course World History #24: 11min
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4QoXKgo_HDY 3 - A Historical Class
Analysis of Guyanese Society - Dr. Walter Rodney 9.5 min - first 5 min
• Rise of Industrial capital & factory system
India: colonial core’s power (Britain’s)
1. Colonial trade in raw materials accumulates
capital
2. Industrialization process
• Mechanical production replaces human energy
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•
Emergence of the factory system
Power of the corporate capital & TWC’s (DVD):
• Cr’s Multinational Corporations (MNCs)
• Cr’s MNCs’ capital moves to peri.s’ labour
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_4Ge_y-x1Zw 2009 Jobs move to
Mexico From a Chrysler Plant in Missouri 4.5 min
• Rise of Monopoly capital in the Cr – oligopolistic MNCs
Monopoly capital: the product of the concentration and centralization of production
Corporate capital: MNCs
•
Economic power and ownership of capital is concentrated in the hands of a
small number of powerful corporations.
• Concentration of capital into large monopolistic or oligopolistic firms or as
investment capital in banks and financial institutions
EOP (DVD): Neoliberal policies: SAP & WC facilitate the power of Cores’ corporate
capital/MNCs
1. MNCs are Direct Foreign Investments (DFI)
2. Rapid accumulation of Finance capital (Banks and short-term foreign
investments)
3. Neoliberal policies: IMF asks the poor to pay for educ, health, common
resources, e.g., land, water
4. Capital market liberalization & tax evasion
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