Three Conclusions
(1) The virus of liberalism still has devastating effects. It has resulted in an “ideological adjustment” perfectly fitted to promoting the expansion of capitalism, an expansion becoming ever more barbaric.
It has persuaded big majorities, even among the younger generation, that they had to content themselves with ‘living in the present moment’, to grasp whatever is immediately at hand, to forget the past, and to pay no heed to the future—on the pretext that utopian imaginings might produce monsters. It has convinced them that the established system allows ‘the flourishing of the individual’ (which it really does not). Pretentious, supposedly novel, academic formulations— ‘postmodernism’, ‘postcolonialism’, ‘cultural studies’, Negri-like animadversions—confer patents of legitimacy to capitulation of the critical spirit and the inventive imagination.The disarray stemming from such interiorized submission is certainly among the causes of the ‘religious revival’. By that I refer to the recrudescence of conservative and reactionary interpretations, religious and quasi-religious, ritualistic and ‘communitarian’. As I have written, the One God (monotheism) remarries with alacrity the One Mammon (moneytheism).
Of course I exclude from this judgment those interpretations of religion that deploy their sense of spirituality to justify taking sides with all social forces struggling for emancipation. But the former are dominant, the latter a minority and often marginalized. Other, no less reactionary, ideological formulas make up in the same way for the void left by the liberalism virus: of this “nationalisms” and ethnic or quasi-ethnic communalisms are splendid examples.
(2) Diversity is, most fortunately, one of the world’s finest realities. But its thoughtless praise entails dangerous confusions. For my part, I have suggested making conspicuous the heritage-diversities which are what they are, and can only be distinguished as positive for the project of emancipation after being critically examined.
I want to avoid confusing such diversity of heritage with the diversity of formulations that look toward invention of the future and toward emancipation.For in that regard there is as much diversity both of analyses, with their underlying cultural and ideological bases, and of proposals for strategic lines of struggle. The First International counted Marx, Bakunin, and followers of Proudhon within its ranks. A fifth international will likewise have to choose diversity as its trump suit. I envisage that it cannot ‘exclude’: it must be a regroupment of the various schools of Marxists (including even marked ‘dogmatists’); of authentic radical reformers who nevertheless prefer to concentrate on goals that are possible in the short term, rather than on distant perspectives; of liberation theologians; of thinkers and activists promoting national renewal within the perspective of universal emancipation; and of feminists and environmentalists who likewise are committed to that perspective. To become clearly conscious of the imperialist nature of the established system is the fundamental condition without which there is no possibility of such a regroupment of activists really working together for a single cause. A fifth international cannot but be clearly anti-imperialist. It cannot content itself with remaining at the level of ‘humanitarian’ interventions like those that the dominant powers offer in place of solidarity and support to the liberation struggles of the Periphery’s peoples, nations, and States. And even beyond such regroupment, broad alliances will have to be sought with all democratic forces and movements struggling against democracy-farce’s betrayals.
(3) If I insist on the anti-imperialist dimension of the combats to be waged, it is because that is the condition without which no convergence is possible between the struggles within the North and those within the South of the planet. I have already said that the weakness—and that is the least one can say—of Northern anti-imperialist consciousness was the main reason for the limited nature of the advances that the Periphery’s peoples had hitherto been able to realize, and then of their retrogression.
The construction of a perspective of convergent struggles runs up against difficulties whose mortal peril to it must not be underestimated.
In the North it runs up against the still broad adhesion to the consensus ideology that legitimizes the democratic farce and is made acceptable thanks to the corrupting effects of the imperialist rent. Nevertheless, the ongoing offensive of monopoly capital against the Northern workers themselves might well help them to become conscious that the imperialist monopolies are indeed their common enemy.Will the unfolding movements toward organized and politicized reconstruction go so far as to understand and teach that the capitalist monopolies are to be expropriated, nationalized in order to be socialized? Until that breaking point has been reached the ultimate power of the capitalist/imperialist monopolies will remain untouched. Any defeats that the South might inflict on those monopolies, reducing the amounts siphoned from them in imperialist rent, can only increase the chances of Northern peoples getting out of their rut. But in the South it still runs up against conflicting expressions of an envisioned future: universalist or backward-looking? Until that conflict has been decided in favor of the former, whatever the Southern peoples might gain in their liberation struggles will remain fragile, limited, and vulnerable. Only serious advances North and South in the directions here indicated will make it possible for the progressive historic bloc to be born.
References
References that would assist the reader to find the path of the formation of the concepts utilized in this chapter.
Recent Works by Samir Amin
Spectres of Capitalism, 1998: Unity and Changes in the Ideology of the Political Economy; Overdetermination or Underdetermination; Withering Away of the Law of Value; Pure Economics, the Contemporary Witchcraft (New York: Monthly Review Press).
Obsolescent Capitalism, 2003: Return of Belle Epoque; Historical Marxism and Historical Keynesianism; Financialization, a Temporary Phenomenon; the Collective Imperialism of The Triad (London: Zed Books).
The Liberal Virus, 2004: Pauperization, the New Agrarian Question, the New Conditions for the Working Class; Ideology of Modernity, (New York: Monthly Review Press).
(and Ali El Kenz), 2005: Europe and the Arab World (London: Zed Books).
(and Karim Mroue), 2006 : Communistes dans le monde arabe (Paris: Le Temps des cerises).
Beyond US Hegemony, 2006: The Drama of Great Revolutions; Imperialism and the Global Expansion of Capitalism, (London: Zed Books).
The World We Wish to See, 2008 (New York: Monthly Review Press). Convergences in diversity.
From Capitalism to Civilization, 2010: Contribution of Maoism; Formal Logics or Materialistic Dialectics; Productivity of Social Labor; the Globalized Law of Value; Market Economy or Capitalism of the Oligopolies; Critique of the Multitude; on the Cultural Front, Full Speed Backward; No Democracy Without Social Progress, (New Delhi: Tulika).
Eurocentrism (Second Edition), 2009: Reason and emancipation; the flexibility of religions; Hellenism, Christianity, Islam, Buddhism, Confucianism (New York: Monthly Review Press).
L’Eveil du Sud, 2008 (Paris: Le Temps des Cerises).
Ending the Crisis of Capitalism or Ending Capitalism, 2011: From One Long Crisis to the Other; Accumulation by Dispossession; Humanitarianism or Internationalism of Peoples? (Cape Town: Pambazuka).
The Law of Worldwide Value, 2010: The Monopoly Rent, the Imperialist Rent; at the Origins of Bandung (New York: Monthly Review).
Delegitimer le capitalisme, 2011 (Bruxelles: Contradictions).
Demba Moussa Dembele, 2011: Samir Amin, intellectuel organique au service de Temancipation du Sud (Dakar: CODRESIA).
Le monde arabe dans la longue duree, le printemps arabe, 2012 (Paris: Le Temps des Cerises).
Global History, 2011: A View From the South (Cape Town: Pambazuka).Older References
Class and Nation, 1980: Communitarian Social Formations, Tributary Social Formations: Transitions: Decadence or Revolutions (New York: Monthly Review Press).
(and Andre Gunder Frank): “Let’s not wait for 1984: Discussion of the Crisis,” in: Gunder Frank, Andre (Ed.): Reflections on the World Economic Crisis (New York: Monthly Review Press, 1981). Important recent articles, in English: “Spectres of Capitalism”, in: Monthly Review, 50,1 (May 1998): 36-39.
“History Conceived as an Eternal Cycle”, in: Review (Fernand Braudel Center), 22,3 (1999): 291-326.
“Post-Maoist China: A Comparison with Post-Communist Russia”, in: Review (Fernand Braudel Center), 22,4 (1999): 375-385.
“Imperialism and Globalization”, in: Monthly Review, 53,2 (June 2001): 6-24.
“Confronting the Empire”, in: Monthly Review, 55,3 (August 2003): 15-22.
“U.S. Imperialism, Europe and the Middle East”, in: Monthly Review, 56,6 (November 2004): 13-33. “Empire and Multitude”, in: Monthly Review, 57,6 (November 2005): 1-12.
“China, Market Socialism and U.S. Hegemony”, in: Review (Fernand Braudel Center) 28,3 (2005): 259-279.
“Samir Amin, interviewed by A. A. Dieng”, in: Development and Change, 38,6 (November 2007): 1149-1159.
“Political Islam in the Service of Imperialism”, in: Monthly Review, 59,7 (December 2007): 1-19. “‘Market Economy’ or Oligopoly Finance Capital?”, in: Monthly Review, 59,11 (April 2008): 51-61. “Capitalism and the Ecological Footprint”, in: Monthly Review, 61,6 (November 2009): 19-22. “Seize the Crisis!”, in: Monthly Review, 61,7 (December 2009): 1-16.
“The Trajectory of Historical Capitalism and Marxism’s Tricontinental Vocation”, in: Monthly Review, 62,9 (February 2011): 1-18.
Important Recent Articles, in French
“Marx et la democratie”, in : La Pensee, no. 328 (2001).
“Cinquante ans apres Bandoung”, in : Recherches Internationales, no. 73 (2005).
“Vers une theologie islamique de la liberation”, in : La Pensee, no.
342 (2005).“L’Islam, une theocratie sans projet social”, in: La Pensee, no. 351 (2007).
“Pour des initiatives independantes des pays du Sud”, in: Utopie critique, no. 50 (2010).
“Capitalisme transnational ou imperialisme collectif?”, in : Recherches Internationales, no. 89 (2011).
“L’internationale de l’obscurantisme”, in : Contradictions (December 2011).
“Critique des propositions du rapport Stiglitz”; at: (11 July 2007).
Other Authors Cited
Altvater, Elmar, 2009: The Plagues of Capitalism: Energy Crisis, Climate Collapse, Hunger, and Financial Instabilities; at: (1 February).
Castellina, Luciana, personal conversations.
Etiemble, 1988: L’Europe chinoise, Vol. 1. (Paris: Gallimard).
Garo, Isabelle, 2000: Marx, un critique de la Philosophie (Paris: Seuil).
Herrera, Remy, 2010: Les experiences revolutionnaires de TAmerique latine (Lyon: Parangon/ Vs).
Herrera, Remy, 2010: Un autre capitalisme n’est pas possible (Paris: Syllepse).
Houtart, Francois, 2005: Delegitimer le capitalisme (Bruxelles: Colophon).
Houtart, Francois, 2010: Agrofuels: Big Profits, Ruined Lives and Ecological Destruction (London: Pluto).
Houtart, Francois, 2011: “El concepto de sumak kawsai (buen vivir) y su correspondencia con el bien comun de la humanidad” at: (2 June).
Laclau, Ernesto, 2007: On Populist Reason (New York: London: Verso).
Rocker, Rudolf, 1997: Nationalism and Culture (Montreal: Black Rose Books).
Uzcategui, Rafael, 2011:. Venezuela: Revolution as Spectacle (Tucson: See Sharp Press).
Winock, Michel, 1999: Le siecle des intellectuels (Paris: Seuil).