It is
imperative to reconstruct the Internationale of workers and peoples
By Samir Amin
1
For the last
thirty years the world system has undergone an extreme centralization of power
in all its dimensions, local and international, economic and military, social
and cultural.
Some thousand
giant corporations and some hundreds of financial institutions that have formed
cartels among themselves, have reduced national and globalized production
systems to the status of sub-contractors.
In this way the financial oligarchies appropriate a growing share of the
profits from labour and from companies that have been transformed into rent
producers for their exclusive benefit.
Having
domesticated the main right-wing and left-wing parties the unions and the
organizations of the so-called civil society, these oligarchies now also
exercise absolute political power as well as the media that is subordinated to
them, creating the necessary disinformation to depoliticize public
opinion. The oligarchies have annihilated
the traditional practice of multi-partyism, replacing it to almost to a one-party
system, controlled by capital.
Representative democracy having lost all its meaning, has lost its
legitimacy.
This late
contemporary capitalism, which is a completely closed system, corresponds to
the criteria of ‘totalitarianism’, although care is taken not to name it as
such. The totalitarianism is still
‘soft’ but it is always ready to resort to extreme violence as soon as the
victims – the majority of workers and peoples – begin to revolt. All changes that are part of this so-called
‘modernization’ must be seen in light of the foregoing analysis. This is thus the case of major ecological
challenges (especially climate change) that capitalism is incapable of
resolving (the Paris agreement of December 2016 was only a smokescreen), as
well as scientific progress and technological innovations (including IT), which
are rigorously subjected to the requirements of the financial profit that they
can make for the monopolies. The
glorification of competitiveness and the freedom of the market that the
subservient media present as guarantees
of the freedom and efficiency of civil society are indeed the antithesis of the
reality, which is riven by violent conflicts between fractions of the existing
oligarchies and is the cause for the destructive effects of their governance.
2
At the world
level, contemporary capitalism always follows the same imperialist logic that
was typical as it became globalized from the start (the colonization of the 19th
century was clearly a form of globalization).
Contemporary ‘globalization’ does not escape this logic: it is nothing else but a new form of
imperialist globalization. This term
‘globalization’, so often used without any definition, hides an important
fact: the deployment of systematic
strategies that have been developed by the historical imperialist powers
(United States, Western and Central European countries, Japan, which I shall
call ‘the Triad’) that continue to pillage the resources of the Global South
and the super-exploitation of its labour that is associated with delocalization
and subcontracting. These powers intend
to maintain their ‘historical privilege’ and to prevent all the other nations
from extricating themselves from the status of dominated peripheries. The history of the last century was in fact
that of the revolt of the peoples of the peripheries of the world system who
were engaged in a socialist de-linking or in attenuated forms of national
liberation, whose page has, for the moment, been turned. The re-colonization now under way, which has
no legitimacy, is therefore fragile.
For this reason
the historical imperialist powers of the Triad have set up a system of
collective military control over the planet, directed by the United
States. Membership of NATO, which is inextricably
linked to the construction of Europe, as also the militarization of Japan,
reflects the requirement of this new collective imperialism which has taken
over the national imperialisms (of the United States, Great Britain, Japan,
Germany, France and a few others) which were formerly in permanent and violent
conflict.
In these
conditions, constructing an international front of workers and the peoples of
the whole world has to be the main objective of the struggle to meet the
challenge of counteracting the spreading of contemporary imperialist
capitalism.
3
Confronted by this
tremendous challenge, the inadequacy of the struggles being carried out by the victims
of the system is all too apparent.
Their weaknesses are of different kinds which I would classify under the
following headings:
i) the extreme
fragmentation of the struggles, whether at the local or world level, which are
always specific and conducted in particular places and subject-matters
(ecology, women’s rights, social services, community demands, etc.) The rare campaigns conducted at the national
or even world level have not had any significant success in that they have not
forced any changes of the policies being carried out by those in power. Many of these struggles have been absorbed by
the system and foster the illusion that it is possible to reform it.
Nevertheless,
there has been an enormous acceleration in the process of generalized
proletarianization. Almost all the
populations in the central capitalist countries are now subjected to the status
of waged workers selling their labour. The
industrialization of regions in the Global South has created worker
proletariats and salaried middle classes while their peasantries are now fully
integrated into the market system. But
the political strategies employed by the powerful have succeeded in fragmenting
this gigantic proletariat into diverse fractions that are often in conflict
with each other. This contradiction must
be overcome.
ii) The peoples of
the Triad (USA, Western and Central Europe, Japan) have renounced international anti-imperialist
solidarity, which has been replaced at best by ‘humanitarian’ campaigns and ‘aid’
programmes that are controlled by the capital of the monopolies. The European political forces that inherited
left-wing traditions thus now support the imperialist vision of existing
globalization.
iii) A new
right-wing ideology has gained support among the people.
In the North, the
central theme of anti-capitalist class struggle has been abandoned, or reduced
to a greatly incomplete expression – for the benefit of a so-called new
definition of the left-wing ‘partner culture’ or communitarianism, separating
the defence of specific rights from the general fight against capitalism.
In certain
countries of the South, the tradition of struggles that associated the
anti-imperialist struggle with social progress has given way to reactionary
backward-looking illusions expressed by religions or pseudo ethics. In other countries of the South, the
successful acceleration of economic growth over the last decades feeds the
illusion that it is possible to construct a ‘developed’ national capitalism
capable of imposing its active participation in shaping globalization.
4
The power of the
oligarchies of contemporary imperialism seems to be indestructible, in the
countries of the Triad and even at the world level (“the end of
history”!). Public opinion subscribes to
its disguise as ‘market democracy’, preferring it to its past adversary –
socialism – which is invariably embellished by such odious sobriquets as
criminal, nationalist or totalitarian autocracies.
However this
system is not viable for many reasons:
i)Contemporary
capitalism is presented as being ‘open’ to criticism and reform, as innovative
and flexible. Some voices claim to put
an end to the abuses of its uncontrolled finance and the permanent austerity
policies that accompany it – and thus ‘save capitalism’. But such calls will remain in vain as present
practices serve the interests of the oligarchs of the Triad – the only ones
that count – as they guarantee the continual increase of wealth in spite of the
economic stagnation that besets their countries.
ii)The European
sub-system is an integral part of imperial globalization. It was conceived in a reactionary spirit, that
was anti-socialist and pro-imperialist, subordinate to the military command of
the United States. Within it, Germany
exercises its hegemony, particularly in the framework of the euro zone and over
Eastern Europe which has been annexed just as Latin America has been annexed by
the United States. ‘German Europe’ serves the nationalist interests of the
German oligarchy, which are expressed with arrogance, as we saw in the Greek
crisis. This Europe is not viable and
its implosion has already started.
iii)The stagnation
of growth in the countries of the Triad contrasts with the acceleration in
growth of regions in the South which have been able to profit from
globalization. It has been concluded
too hastily that capitalism is alive and well, even if its centre of gravity is
moving from the old countries of Atlantic West to the South, particularly
Asia. In actual fact the obstacles to
pursuing this historical corrective movement are likely to become increasingly
violent, including military aggression.
The imperial powers do not intend to allow any country of the periphery
– great or small – to free themselves from domination.
iv)The ecological
devastation that is necessarily associated with capitalist expansion is
reinforcing the reasons why this system is not viable.
We are now in the
phase of the ‘autumn of capitalism’ without this being strengthened by the
emergence of ‘the people’s spring’ and a socialist perspective. The possibility of substantial progressive
reforms of capitalism in its current stage is only an illusion. There is no alternative other than that
enabled by a renewal of the international radical left, capable of carrying out
– and not just imagining – socialist advances.
It is necessary to end crisis-ridden capitalism rather than try to end
the crisis of capitalism.
Based on a first
hypothesis, nothing decisive will affect the attachment of the peoples of the
Triad to their imperialist option, especially in Europe. The victims of the system will remain
incapable of conceiving their way out of the paths that have been traced by the
‘European project’ which has to be deconstructed before it can then be
reconstructed with another vision. The
experiences of Syriza, Podemos and France Insoumise , the hesitations of Die
Linke and others testify to the extent and complexity of the challenge. The facile accusation of ‘nationalism’ of
those critical of Europe does not hold water.
The European project is increasingly visible as being that of the
bourgeois nationalism of Germany. There
is no alternative in Europe, as elsewhere, to the setting up of national,
popular and democratic projects (not bourgeois, indeed anti-bourgeois) that
will begin the delinking from imperialist globalization. It is necessary to deconstruct the extreme
centralization of wealth and the power that is associated with the system.
According to this
hypothesis, the most probable outcome will be a remake of the 20th
century: advances made exclusively in
some of the peripheries of the system.
But these advances will remain fragile, as have those of the past, and
for the same reason – the permanent warfare waged against them by the
imperialist power centres, the success of which is greatly due to their own
limits and deviations.
Whereas the hypothesis
of a worker and people’s internationalism opens up the way to further
evolutions that are necessary and possible.
The first of these
ways is that of the ‘decadence of civilization’. In that case, these evolutions are not to be
masterminded by anyone, their trail must be blazed only by the needs created by
the situation. However, in our epoch,
given the power of ecological and military destruction and the disposition of
the powerful to use it, the risk, denounced by Marx in his time, that there is
a very real risk that the fighting will destroy all the camps that oppose each
other. The second path, by contrast,
will require the lucid and organized intervention of the international front of
the workers and the peoples.
5
Creating a new
Internationale of workers and peoples must be the main objective for the
genuine militants who are convinced of the odious nature of the world imperialist
capitalist system that we have at present.
It is a heavy responsibility and the task requires several years before
giving any tangible results. As for
myself, I put forward the following proposals:
i)The aim should
be to establish an Organization (the
new Internationale) and not just a ‘movement’.
This involves moving beyond the concept of a discussion forum. It also involves analysing the
inadequacies of the notion, still
prevalent, that the ‘movements’ claim to be horizontal and are hostile to
so-called vertical organizations on the pretext that the latter are by their
very nature anti-democratic: that the
organization is, in fact, the result of action which by itself generates
‘leaders’. The latter can aspire to
dominate, even manipulate the movements.
But it is also possible to avoid this danger through appropriate
statutes. This should be discussed.
ii)The experience
of the worker Internationales should be seriously studied, even if they belong
to the past. This should be done, not
in order to ‘choose’ a model among them, but to invent the most suitable form
for contemporary conditions.
iii) Such an
invitation should be addressed to a good number of combative parties and
organizations. A committee should first
be set up to get the project started.
iv) I don’t want
to make this text any heavier. However,
I attach some complementary texts
(in English and in
French):
a) a fundamental text on the unity and diversity
of movements towards socialism in modern history;
b) a text on the implosion of the European
project;
c) some texts on:
the audacity required for renewing the radical left; reading Marx; the
new agrarian question; the lesson of October 1917 and of Maoism; the necessary
renewal of national, popular projects.
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