Louis Proyect
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This post is a little late since I had to attend to some personal
business this week. My hopes are that the flow of posts will increase in
tempo now that we have moved past the rather thorny topic of crisis
theory.
Just about two years ago I wrote an article titled "Did Karl Marx
endorse imperialism? ", a question that I want to revisit in the context
of a very interesting exchange between Eduard Bernstein and E. Belfort
Bax, a British socialist who was one of our first great
anti-imperialists.
To start with, it is necessary to acknowledge that the question of Marx
endorsing imperialism achieves a certain legitimacy because of
formulations in Marx's writings themselves. Even if Marx and Engels
condemned British colonialism in Ireland, there were other occasions
when they seemed open to the idea of imperialism as a necessary evil in
ridding a country of feudal vestiges. Probably the most explicit
instance of this line of reasoning is Marx's early Tribune articles on
India, where he says things like this in 1853 :
"England, it is true, in causing a social revolution in Hindostan, was
actuated only by the vilest interests, and was stupid in her manner of
enforcing them. But that is not the question. The question is, can
mankind fulfil its destiny without a fundamental revolution in the
social state of Asia? If not, whatever may have been the crimes of
England she was the unconscious tool of history in bringing about that
revolution."
full:
http://louisproyect.wordpress.com/2008/05/17/the-bernstein-bax-debate/
^^^
CB: And of course, my man did say the following:
"Force is the midwife of every old society pregnant with a new one. It
is itself an economic power. "
http://www.marxists.org/archive/marx/works/1867-c1/ch31.htm
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