SOCIALISM

Imperialism and Globalisation

Like all systems, capitalism is a changing system which has its own history. For over a hundred years we have been living in the imperialist phase of capitalism. Imperialism is an advanced stage of capitalism with three main features:

• growing monopolisation of the economy by a handful of corporations
• the increasing export of productive capital to underdeveloped parts of the world, extending capitalist exploitation and oppression globally
• the growing integration of finance capital with productive capital, leading increasingly to the dominance of finance capital

By the end of the 19^th century the capitalist accumulation system was defined by a concentration of power and resources, mainly at two levels. Firstly was the level of the production unit: instead of scattered small and medium sized workshops, increasingly production was organised into large, integrated units such as large factories. Starting a production process now required money reaching into millions instead of a few thousands. Secondly was the level of the firm or company. Because production was organised on a large factory, production line basis, there was also the coming together of many distinct capitals in the modern joint stock company or corporation.

Capitalist propaganda presents capitalism as a "competitive" system operating in a "free market", In fact competition and free markets have long since ceased to be the dominant features of capitalism. Huge global transnational corporations dominate and manipulate the markets. They set their own prices and they suppress competition as much as possible.

In the last quarter of the 19^th century the growing accumulation and concentration of capital resulted in over-accumulation. Capitalist countries needed to find new markets and investment opportunities which resulted in a vast movement of capital into Africa, the East, the Middle East and Latin America. This period was known as the "scramble for Africa". In the space of about 10 years the leading capitalist powers carved out almost all our continent as exclusive colonial territories for themselves.

The colonial domination of Africa was less about "developing" the continent than about profiting from vast natural wealth and cheap labour. Lenin described the main features of imperialism as:

• capitalist over-accumulation in the developed capitalist countries had led to increasing export of productive capital;
• this had required larger companies which had led to

• growing monopolisation and
• a scramble between imperialist powers to control the world’s resources.

There was one more important feature of imperialism that Lenin also underlined:

The development of imperialism brought with it the need to assemble vast financial resources. However, bankers were no longer content just to lend money when they could reap millions through direct investment. This resulted in the intermingling of productive capital and banking capital.

The trillions of dollars that move around the globe each day completely dwarf the international flows of more stable foreign productive investment. The blood-sucking, financial tick that once lived on the back of the productive cow has now completely overgrown and overwhelmed its host.

This situation lies at the heart of the latest phase of imperialism, which we call:

All of the features of imperialism have been intensified over the past 25 years. The main features of this new phase of globalisation are:

• a global casino economy, dominated by trillions of speculative dollars trading every day. This has been helped by:

• major technology advances in information and communications – the computer revolution, cell phones, the internet, satellite TV, etc.
• the growth of Transnational Corporations (TNC’s)

In the earlier period of imperialism, the main capitalist firms were huge multinational corporations. Their main productive base located in an imperialist home-market – the USA, Britain, Germany, Japan etc. They drew their raw materials from major operations in the developing world. This is why they had a multinational character.

Over the past 25 years the imperialist economy has been dominated by TNC’s. more and more, production itself is organised transnationally. According to the United Nations Development Programme, 50 of the world’s 100 richest economies are no longer countries, but TNC’s. 500 TNC’s now account for 30% of the world’s total output.

This huge historical process we are now witnessing has resulted in deepening inequality, oppression and human misery. While the richest countries in the world have become richer, most of the world has become poorer. Over the past 25 years, many of the gains of post-independence Africa have been rolled back. In a sense, Africa has been re-colonised by the imperialist powers. But this time it has not been the armies which have colonised Africa, it has been international bankers (using the IMF and the World Bank), manipulating the debt problem, who have undermined the independence of many countries on our continent.

The impact of globalisation has been particularly harsh. Neo-liberal globalisation has exploited gender inequalities and deepened and reinforced them in several ways:

• over the last 25 years government budgets around the world for health-care, education and pensions has been slashed. These measure have thrown millions of women back into the invisible realm of "private" unpaid labour – like caring for the young, aged and sick;
• at the same time there has been an increase in the feminisation of productive labour. As globalising capital ran away from unionised work-forces in the core imperialist economies, productive capital was invested in certain developing economies where environmental, health and labour market regulations were minimal, particularly in the export processing zones. During this period when EPZ’s s specialised in labour intensive production, up to 80% of the workforce was female. South East Asian governments even advertised the "docility" of their female labour force! In the 1990’s however, female labour has been replaced once more by skilled male labour. Hundreds of thousands of retrenched women workers gained nothing from globalisation except a few years of highly exploitative work.
• Globalising capital has also sought to make the labour market and production processes more "flexible". The focus has shifted to isolated and non-unionised workers who are not covered by unemployment insurance and pension funds. This mainly affects poorly paid female workers.

What can we do about globalisation - globalise solidarity

Our agenda must be to advance an alternative view of globalisation. The injustice and misery caused by capitalist globalisation means that we are not alone in seeking to pose a different global agenda.

• the conditions have been created for greater international worker solidarity
• the instability of the economic markets has created the space to explore alternatives, for calling for greater regulation etc.
• the obvious failures of the IMF and World Bank in Africa has created space for advancing progressive agendas – including debt cancellation, developmental aid, and the need for regional and continental solidarity
• Many of the technical advances brought about by globalisation are also available to progressive forces.

Marx and Engels summed up the challenges and possibilities in the Communist Manifesto when they noted how capitalism always does two things – it deepens oppression but it also creates the material conditions for greater international solidarity.