Re: [OPE] Britain--parasitic and decaying capitalism: A comment

From: Dave Zachariah <davez@kth.se>
Date: Sat Jan 16 2010 - 04:12:23 EST

On 2010-01-15 23:23, Paul Bullock wrote:
> Imperialism is the dominance of finance capital! the desire to annex
> any and all economic activity for its own ends...

Given the points made in this thread, I think it this assertion can no
longer hold up.

   1. While the rentier interest goes some way to explain the
      development of the British empire during the period 1875-1945 it
      can hardly have been the dominant factor in the lesser developed
      European empires, such as Spain or Portugal, during that period.
   2. During the period 1945-1975 the rentier interest was held back and
      could not possibly be the prime mover behind the US military
      interventions, which I assume you take as 'imperialist'.
   3. Even the characteristic or result of imperialism you consider to
      be important, the division of the world, was not driven by
      rivalling capitalist empires during this period. The division was
      instead rooted in the conflict between two powerful state
      apparatuses with two incompatible modes of production.

//Dave Z
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Received on Sat Jan 16 04:16:30 2010

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