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Globalisation:
the end of the age of imperialism?
IT HAS BECOME increasingly fashionable to use
the term globalisation as a description of the
international economy and international
political relations. Globalisation is meant to
have taken over from imperialism, when a handful
of large states openly and directly ran most or
the world. The bosses' magazine,
The Economist, ran a major article on this New
World Order called 'The New Geopolitics' last
July. It described this supposed transformation:
"The imperial age was a time when countries A, B
and C took over the governments of countries X,
Y and Z. The aim now is to make it possible for
the peoples of X, Y and Z to govern themselves,
freeing them from the local toughs who deny them
that right."
Many on the left, including some anarchists,
have critically adapted this description of the
New World Order. Central to this is the idea
that the rapid movement of money made possible
by the 'information age' and the growth of
multinationals means that the age of imperialism
- when powerful nation states dominated the
world - has been replaced by a more abstract and
invisible but equally powerful rule by capital
which is not tied to any state.
At first sight such a description seems
compelling, it is 'common sense' that
international trade has increased and that
treaties like the European Union are breaking
down the old nation state. But does
globalisation provide us with an accurate
description of how the world works?
In fact the Economist article admits that
"...before the first world war some rich
countries were doing almost as much trade with
the outside world as a proportion of GDP as they
are doing now (and Japan was doing far more)".
Assuming 'rich' to be a polite word for
'imperialist' here, what has changed is in fact
the sheer volume of world trade (and wealth)
along with the fact that smaller countries are
now far more involved.
End of the nation state?
But this is not the end of the nation state. In
fact since 1914 the number of states had
rocketed from 62 to 74 by 1946 and today it
stands at 193. The other surprise is that in the
wealthy nations state spending as a percentage
of GDP (a measure of the relative wealth of a
country) has actually increased since 1980. The
central idea of globalisation - capital becoming
increasingly independent of any particular
nation state therefore has to be questioned.
Again the Economist is unusually honest here in
asking what is "the central reason why a state
remains". It answers "the State is still the
chief wielder of organised armed force".
Recent wars clearly divide into two types. Some
involve geographic neighbours fighting each
other, commonly over border demarcations like
India and Pakistan. Others involve interventions
by countries that may be 1000's of km's away,
most commonly on the basis of 'humanitarian
intervention' as with the UN interventions in
Iraq and Somalia or the NATO intervention in
Kosovo. But when we look at these second type of
interventions we find that, far from the distant
countries being a random collection or selected
according to size, every single one of these
interventions has been led by one country, the
USA.
Beyond this the second and third most important
forces in the intervention will also be drawn
from a very small pool of countries including
Britain, France and Italy. Clearly, on the
military side at least, such interventions are
not random but are dominated by a small number
of what the more old fashioned amongst us would
term imperialist powers.
The US is the dominant power and, with its NATO
junior partners, has proved able to dictate to
any and every other nation on the planet. Indeed
NATO has no realistic rivals. The closest you
might come is an imaginary alliance of China and
Russia. This would face a power with not only a
larger and far better equipped military force
but which also has over ten times the economic
muscle (NATO's GDP in 1997 was 16,255 billion
dollars, Russia's was 447, China's 902).
However the spread of democratic ideas, and
knowledge about other countries, has meant that
'old style' imperialism has lost its popularity.
That is why imperialism today is far more likely
to hide behind 'humanitarianism' and a whole
range of supposedly international bodies. When
we look at these 'international' bodies,
however, we find that they are constructed in
such a way that only the major powers have a
real say in decision making.
The United Nations
The United Nations was the great hope for many
as an alternative to war, or to a peace where
rich countries could do as they please. Even
today many well-meaning people all too often
refer to the UN as if it was an alternative to
US or NATO domination of the globe. The UN may
claim to be a global body representing all
countries, but in reality - for effective
intervention - it may only act with the say so
of a tiny number of powerful military powers.
These are the five permanent members of the
Security Council (USA, Britain, France, Russia
and China), each with the ability to veto any
intervention that goes against their interests.
In effect the UN is a cover behind which these
countries can wage war when it suits them - as
when the UN supposedly went into Iraq to protect
Kuwaiti sovereignty in the 1991 Gulf war. But
they can stop the UN acting in other cases, so
for instance no UN body invaded the US to
protect Nicaraguan sovereignty when the Reagan
administration were mining its harbours in the
1980's.
Even where the smaller countries disapprove and
partly block military action behind the UN
banner, the NATO countries have proved adapt at
ignoring calls for negotiated solutions and
using UN resolutions as an excuse for war as in
the ongoing bombing of Iraq. Often these excuses
are astounding hypocritical. NATO could bomb
Serbia supposedly to protect ethnic Albanians
living in Kosovo from Serbian paramilitaries yet
stands by while Turkey (a NATO member) massacres
ethnic Kurds.
The Security Council mechanism by which the
major powers control the UN and hence military
intervention is quite well known on the left.
However what is not so widely realised are the
similar mechanisms that exist by which - without
resorting to arms - the major imperialist
powers, and the US in particular, can control
the world economy. Once this is revealed the
idea of globalisation becomes no more then a
cheap card trick designed to disguise and take
away our attention from the imperialist
domination of the world.
Economic control - Debt, the World Bank and the
IMF
One aspect of this economic control has recently
got a lot of attention, if perhaps a little
indirectly. That is the massive debt owed by
'Third World' countries. The Jubilee 2000
campaign, which demands that 'unpayable' debt be
abolished, has had considerable success in
mobilising tens of thousands on demonstrations
in support of this demand. Some 800,000 people
in Ireland alone have signed the petition for
the abolition of the debt. What is seldom
mentioned is the central part debt plays for the
western powers in dictating how third world
economies are organised.
The debt crisis of the late 1970's and early
1980's proved an ideal leverage for the western
powers to force 'free trade' on the 'third
world'. This occurred when third world countries
faced with falling incomes and rising interest
rates defaulted on their loans.
Before this many countries had followed a policy
of 'import substituionism' which meant that they
tried to manufacture goods like, for instance,
cars that they had previously imported. Without
suggesting this sort of policy offered a
positive alternative role it did have one big
disadvantage for the imperialist powers, it
tended to deny them both markets and cheap raw
materials.
What the imperialist powers wanted, and what
they essentially have won, was a system where
the third world provided cheap raw materials &
labour and acted as a market to consume the
products of companies with their bases in the
imperialist countries. But for obvious reasons
this would not be a popular policy for the
people of those countries, except perhaps the
few who could be promised a share of the profits
generated if they would administer the system.
When the debt crisis hit in the mid-1980's,
starting with Mexico's declaration that it was
unable to repay loans in 1982, the World Bank
and the International Monetary Fund stepped in.
Despite the fact that these institutions are
household names most people have very little
idea of what they do or how they function. Until
recently they were quite happy to keep things
that way.
One dollar - one vote
In summary, both these bodies are designed in a
way which favours the powerful western nations -
they are based on the pro-business principle of
"one dollar - one vote". What is more, their
internal decision making structure gives the US
a veto - enabling it to block any decisions that
go against it's economic interests. They are
technically part of the UN structure, but in
reality the western powers have an even greater
say in them then they have in the UN. In the
case of the IMF the US holds 17% of the vote
while only 15% is required for a veto. In the
case of the World Bank it has managed to insist
that every single president is a US citizen.
Thanks in particular to the debt crisis, the
power of these institutions is so great that no
country can defy their dictates without losing
the ability to engage in foreign trade.
The debt crisis forced most developing nations
to hand over control of at least part of their
economies to the IMF and World Bank. This
occurred in the 1980's when individual countries
became unable to repay loans. At that stage the
IMF and World Bank would step in and 'offer' to
facilitate re-structuring of the loans providing
the country concerned implemented an IMF
dictated 'Structural Adjustment Program'.
Typically these involve removing barriers to
imports and removing whatever protection of
workers 'rights' and pay exists. This is usually
achieved through high inflation, privatisation
and anti-union laws (and indeed physical
repression). Alongside this, spending on
education and health are slashed. In the 1980's
an official of the Inter-American Development
Bank described these as "an unparalleled
opportunity to achieve, in the debtor countries,
the structural reforms favoured by the Reagan
administration".
The payoff
It shouldn't be imagined, through, that this
means the local ruling class likes these
policies. In reality today most Latin American
economies are controlled by locally born but US
educated economics graduates. As Latin American
intellectual Xavier Gorostiaga observed "Neo-
liberalism has united the elite's of the South
with those of the North and created the biggest
convergence of financial, technological and
military power in history".
In 1960, the income of the wealthiest 20% of the
world's population was 30 times greater than
that of the poorest 20%. Today it is over 60
times greater. The top 20%, though, is too crude
a measure. According to the UN "the assets of
the 200 richest people are more than the
combined income of 41% of the world's people."
This highlights what is perhaps the major post-
war change to the imperialist system. Before the
war the old colonialist countries like Britain
and France had controlled it. They favoured a
very obvious system of direct rule with the
local ruling class being composed of people sent
out from the imperialist country for that
purpose. This system caused great resentment
amongst the local middle class as it denied them
the possibility of promotion into these roles,
and more often than not the racist nature of the
imperialist power meant the local middle class
had to put up with all sorts of petty
oppressions.
The post-war years saw many anti-colonial
revolts in which the working class and peasants,
under middle class leadership, united to throw
out the imperialists. With the growth of these
movements, and the growth in the military and
economic might of the US, the old imperialist
powers were frequently defeated and a section of
the local ruling class would take over the
running of the country, often with American aid
but sometimes with Russian aid.
As US dominance grew a post-colonial system was
constructed where, in return for accepting terms
of trade favourable to US business, the local
ruling class would be allowed some local
control. Some, of course, were not happy with
this but by the 1980's the debt crisis on the
one hand and the collapse of the USSR on the
other meant they had little choice and most came
over.
The US has constructed a 'New World Order' in
which it pulls almost all the economic and
military strings. With such control there is no
need for it to rely on 'old fashioned' direct
imperialist control. Through the IMF/World Bank
and the World Trade Organisation (WTO) it can
set the rules of global trade with its junior
partners of the G7 nations (the seven most
powerful economies).
Recently it has not flinched from using these
powers on its 'junior partners' in particular
with its attempts at imposing Genetically
Modified foods on reluctant European states. The
handful of 'rogue' states that are reluctant to
accept its rule have been easily contained,
militarily and economically in the case of North
Korea and Cuba or bombed into the stone age in
the case of the ongoing war against Iraq.
Those who suffer from this new imperial order
include the workers and peasants of the
developing world. Real wages in most African
countries have fallen by 50-60% since the early
1980s and in Mexico, Costa Rica and Bolivia
average wages have fallen by a third since 1980.
But workers in parts of the developed world, and
in particular the US, have also seen falling
living standards and wages.
This global economic order had given new weapons
to the major companies by which they can dictate
economic policy to even the governments of the
developed world. The threat of mass withdrawal
of investment has essentially ended the post-
war social democratic compromise throughout
Europe, in particular in countries like Britain.
The nation state continues to be central to this
'New World Order'. Multinationals may trade
everywhere but their headquarters,
administrative and research facilities are
concentrated in the imperialist nations. The
recent trade war about bananas grown in the
Caribbean, for instance, was fought between US
and European based transnationals, despite the
fact that neither grows significant quantities
of bananas.
Limited space here only allows a brief
exploration of these bodies behind which US
imperialism hides. Importantly I haven't touched
on resistance to this domination that has taken
many forms. This July saw over 250,000 Turkish
workers demonstrating against IMF imposed
'reforms'.
June saw the global J18 day of action; this
November will see widespread action against the
WTO summit to be held in Toronto, Canada. But
what should be obvious is that before we can
decide on the most effective form of action
against imperialism we need to identify its real
nature - despite whatever mask it may choose to
hide behind.
Andrew Flood
<-><-><-><-><-><-><-><-><-><-><-><-><-><-><-><-><->
This article is from Workers Solidarity No 58
published in Oct 1999
More articles from this issue at
http://flag.blackened.net/revolt/ws99.html
>>From Irelands's Workers Solidarity Movement
http://flag.blackened.net/revolt/wsm.html
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http://flag.blackened.net/revolt/inter/email_lists.html
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