IMPERIALISM BY LENIN

ABSTRACT

Note: In the 20th Century writers used a lot of verbiage- it was standard procedure. I have taken Lenin's Imperialism and reduced it to its bare essentials in the belief that it is easier to read and understand.

 
INSERT; FIRST, the system is unplanned and  unstable, This anarchy of production cannot reconciliate the social character of production and the private confiscation of production, and thus makes the recurring crises inevitable.(stock market crashes)
SECOND. It is an asymmetrical system, that is, the chasing after wealth produces the concentration and centralization of capital and the wealth of the society in a few  hands.
THIRD. The global economy is market oriented and nationalist,  and requires military protection  to function globally (endless wars).
FOURTH. The transnational corporations exclude  all the citizens of the world community, who have no say so in their decisions, and do not satisfy the needs of the population. Protestantism is your personal striving on earth, which leads to favor from God. You are responsible for yourself, and the idea of community is diminished.
FIFTH. The development and use of resources of the first world is simply ecologically unsustainable. The corporations are incapable of reducing their mad dash for ever greater wealth and usurpation of more and more resources. The way they use the law of value is incompatible with a democratic, equal and sustainable global society, stable for everyone. Global warming and capitalism are intertwined. Capitalism is the number one cause of poverty. Air pollution kills 7 million people a year.The root of war is oligarchic capitalism.
 SIXTH- In late capitalism, capital can be bought for a determined time. The selling of merchandise on credit favors the continuity of production. Capital uses this credit to economically and politically subjugate  people. It is a fountain of wealth based on the exploitation of the workers. It comes to a halt with the limited solvency of those who ask for the loan. The payment of the loan absorbs almost all of the debtor's income, and if it is not paid within the agreed upon time frame, the goods of the debtor are put up for auction, pauperizing the population while  a small part gets richer and richer.
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MONOPOLIES-  at a certain stage of its development concentration itself, leads straight to monopoly, for a score or so of giant enterprises can easily arrive at an agreement, and on the other hand, the hindrance to competition, the tendency towards monopoly, arises from the huge size of the enterprises.
CARTELS- Cartels come to an agreement on the terms of sale, dates of payment, etc. They divide the markets among themselves. They fix the quantity of goods to be produced. They fix prices. They divide the profits among the various enterprises,
1.-Combination levels out the fluctuations of trade and therefore assures to the combined enterprises a more stable rate of profit.
2.- it has the effect of eliminating trade.
3.- it has the effect of rendering  technical improvements, and the acquisition of superprofits over and above those obtained by the ‘pure’ (i.e,, non-combined) enterprises.
4.- it strengthens the position of the combined enterprises relative to the ‘pure’ enterprises, strengthens them in the competitive struggle in periods of serious depression, when the fall in prices of raw materials does not keep pace with the fall in prices of manufactured goods.
 
An ill-considered policy drove prices up still more rapidly and still higher than would have been the case if there had been no cartels. and nearly all these cartels perished ingloriously in the smash. Another five-year period of bad trade and low prices followed, but a new spirit reigned in industry; the depression  was regarded as nothing more than a pause before another boom. Cartels have become one of the foundations of economic life. They are winning one field of industry after another now the general public takes it for granted that large spheres of economic life have been, as a general rule, removed from the realm of free competition. Capitalism has been transformed into imperialism.



CONTROLLING PRODUCTION-  (1) stopping supplies of raw materials ... one of the most important methods of compelling adherence to the cartel,
(2) stopping the supply of labour by means of “alliances” (i.e., of agreements between the capitalists and the trade unions by which the latter permit their members to work only in cartelised enterprises)
(3) stopping deliveries;
(4) closing trade outlets;
(5) agreements with the buyers, by which the latter undertake to trade only with the cartels;
(6) systematic price cutting (to ruin “outside” firms, i.e., those which refuse to submit to the monopolists.  (7) stopping credits;
(8) boycott.
 
Here the monopolists throttling those who do not submit to their yoke, The greatest success no longer goes to the merchant whose technical and commercial experience enables him best of all to estimate the needs of the buyer, it goes to the speculative "genius" who knows how to estimate, or even only to sense in advance, the organisational development and the possibilities of certain connections between individual enterprises and the banks. Translated into ordinary human language this means that the development of capitalism has arrived at a stage when, although commodity production still reigns and continues to be regarded as the basis of economic life, it has in reality been undermined and the bulk of the profits go to the "geniuses" of financial manipulation. At the basis of these manipulations and swindles lies socialised production; but the immense progress of mankind, which achieved this socialisation, goes to benefit the speculators. Petty-bourgeois critics of capitalist imperialism dream of going back to “free”, “peaceful”, and “honest” competition.

RAISING PRICES- the increase in profits resulting from this raising of prices we must add that the industries which process raw materials (and not semi-manufactures) not only secure advantages from the cartel formation in the shape of high profits, to the detriment of the finished goods industry,  which did not exist under free competition.

MONOPOLY PRICES-  The prices fixed are monopoly prices: 230 to 280 marks a car-load, when the cost price is 180 marks! The enterprises pay a dividend of from 12 to 16 per cent—and it must not be forgotten that the “geniuses” of modern speculation know how to pocket big profits besides what they draw in dividends. In order to prevent competition in such a profitable industry, the monopolists even resort to  spread false rumours about the bad situation in their industry; anonymous warnings are published in the newspapers, like the following: “Don’t invest your capital in the cement industry!”; lastly, they buy up “outsiders” (those outside the syndicates) and pay them compensation. Monopoly hews a path for itself everywhere without scruple as to the means, from paying a “modest” sum to buy off competitors, to the American device of employing dynamite against them. That cartels can abolish crises is a fable spread by bourgeois economists who at all costs desire to place capitalism in a favourable light. Monopoly intensifies the anarchy inherent in capitalist production .

CONCENTRATION OF WEALTH-  a prodigious increase of capital overflows the brim, flows abroad, etc.  the extremely rapid rate of technical progress gives rise to increasing  disparity between the various spheres of national economy, to anarchy and crises.  in such periods of radical economic change, speculation develops on a large scale.

CRISES- Crises of every kind— increase the tendency towards  towards monopoly. The crisis of 1900 resulted in a far greater concentration of industry than the crisis of 1873: But we shall only have a very insufficient understanding of the real power and the significance of modern monopolies if we do not take into consideration the part played by the banks.

BANKS AND THEIR ROLE The terrorism of the banks consists of the following:  "We must reckon with the possibility that the next general meeting of your syndicate,  may decide on measures which are likely to effect changes in your enterprise which are unacceptable to us. We deeply regret that, for these reasons, we are obliged henceforth to withdraw the credit which had hitherto been allowed you. But if the said next general meeting does not decide upon measures which are unacceptable to us, and if we receive suitable guarantees on this matter for the future, we shall be quite willing to open negotiations with you on the grant of a new credit." The most common procedure for making balance-sheets indecipherable is to divide a single business into several parts by setting up ‘daughter companies’— private property is sacred, and no one can be prohibited from buying, selling, exchanging or hypothecating shares. Finance capital, concentrated in a few hands and exercising a virtual monopoly, exacts enormous and ever-increasing profits in the billions from the floating of companies, issue of stock, state loans, etc., strengthens the domination of the financial oligarchy and levies tribute upon the whole of society for the benefit of monopolists. During periods of industrial boom, the profits of finance capital are immense, but during periods of depression, small and unsound businesses go out of existence, and the big banks acquire “holdings” in them by buying them up for a mere song, or participate in profitable billions, inevitably penetrates into every sphere of public life, regardless of the form of government. Imperialism, or the domination by finance capital, is that highest stage of capitalism in which this separation reaches  the supremacy of finance capital over all other forms of capital, it means the predominance of the rentier and of the financial oligarchy; it means that a small number of financially “powerful” states stand out among all the rest. Typical of the latest stage of capitalism, when monopolies rule, is the export of capital. In  backward countries profits are usually high, for capital is scarce, the price of land is relatively low, wages are low, raw materials are cheap. The export of capital is made possible by a number of backward countries having already been drawn into world capitalist intercourse; main railways for the transport of goods out of the country have been built in those countries, elementary conditions for industrial development have been created, etc. The need to export capital arises from the fact that in a few countries capitalism has become “overripe” and owing to the backward state of agriculture and the poverty of the masses capital cannot find a field for “profitable” investment. Finance capital has led to the actual division of the world. And then the German and American trusts concluded an agreement by which they divided the world between them. Competition between them ceased.  This  circumstance is the most important; it  shows us the historico-economic meaning of what is taking place; for the forms of the struggle may and do constantly change in accordance with varying, relatively specific and temporary causes, but the substance of the struggle, its class content, positively cannot change while classes exist.

COLONIAL POSSESSIONS the growth of the urban and industrial population is more likely to be hindered by a shortage of raw materials for industry than by a shortage of food. For example, there is a growing shortage of timber—the price of which is steadily rising—of leather, and of raw materials for the textile industry. “Associations of manufacturers are making efforts to create an equilibrium between agriculture and industry in the whole of world economy The free market has become a thing of the past; monopolist syndicates and trusts are restricting it with every passing day, and “simply” improving conditions in agriculture should mean improving the conditions of the masses, raising wages and reducing profits. Where, except in the imagination of sentimental reformists, are there any trusts capable of concerning themselves with the condition of the masses instead of the conquest of colonies? Finance capital is interested not only in the already discovered sources of raw materials but also in potential sources, because present-day technical development is extremely rapid, and land which is useless today may be improved tomorrow if new methods are devised (to this end a big bank can equip a special expedition of engineers, agricultural experts, etc.) if large amounts of capital are invested. The pursuit of exporting capital also give  impetus to the conquest of colonies, for in the colonial market it is easier to employ monopoly methods  to eliminate competition, to ensure supplies, to secure the necessary “connections”, etc. The  superstructure which grows up on the basis of finance capital, its politics and its ideology, stimulates the striving for colonial conquest. (AFRICOM, NATO, NAFTA, etc.) All the free territory of the globe, with the exception of China, has been occupied by the powers of Europe and North America. This has already brought about several conflicts and shifts of spheres of influence, and these foreshadow more terrible upheavals in the near future.  All Europe and America have been afflicted with the fever of colonial expansion, of imperialism.

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INSERT:They came after Julian because he exposed the more than 15,000 unreported deaths of Iraqi civilians; because he exposed the torture and abuse of some 800 men and boys, aged between 14 and 89, at Guantánamo; because he exposed that Hillary Clinton in 2009 ordered US diplomats to spy on U.N. Secretary General Ban Ki Moon and other U.N. representatives from China, France, Russia, and the UK, spying that included obtaining DNA, iris scans, fingerprints, and personal passwords, part of the long pattern of illegal surveillance that included the eavesdropping on UN Secretary General Kofi Annan in the weeks before the US-led invasion of Iraq in 2003; because he exposed that Barack Obama, Hillary Clinton and the CIA orchestrated the June 2009 military coup in Honduras that overthrew the democratically elected president Manuel Zelaya, replacing it with a murderous and corrupt military regime; because he exposed that George W. Bush, Barack Obama and General David Petraeus prosecuted a war in Iraq that under post-Nuremberg laws is defined as a criminal war of aggression, a war crime, that they authorized hundreds of targeted assassinations, including those of U.S. citizens in Yemen, and that they secretly launched missile, bomb, and drone attacks on Yemen, killing scores of civilians; because he exposed that Goldman Sachs paid Hillary Clinton $657,000 to give talks, a sum so large it can only be considered a bribe, and that she privately assured corporate leaders she would do their bidding while promising the public financial regulation and reform; because he exposed the internal campaign to discredit and destroy British Labour Party leader Jeremy Corbyn by members of his own party; because he exposed how the hacking tools used by the CIA and the National Security Agency permits the wholesale government surveillance of our televisions, computers, smartphones and anti-virus software, allowing the government to record and store our conversations, images and private text messages, even from encrypted apps.

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 A SPECIAL STAGE OF CAPITALISM
(1) the concentration  has created monopolies which play a decisive role in economic life;
(2) the basis of this finance capital is of a financial oligarchy;
(3) the export of capital as distinguished from the export of commodities
(4) the international monopolist capitalist associations which share the world among themselves, and
(5) the territorial division of the whole world

PARASITISM. Monopoly inevitably engenders a tendency of stagnation and decay, people who live by “clipping coupons”, who take no part in any enterprise whatever, whose profession is idleness. The export of capital, one of the most essential economic bases of imperialism, still more completely isolates the rentiers from production and sets the seal of parasitism on the whole country that lives by exploiting the labour of several overseas countries and colonies which have been transformed from industrial into creditor states. Notwithstanding the absolute increase in industrial output and the export of manufactured goods, there is an increase in the relative importance of income from interest and dividends, issues of securities, commissions and speculation in the whole of the national economy, which forms the economic basis of imperialist ascendancy. The creditor is more firmly attached to the debtor than the seller is to the buyer. The increase in immigration into these countries from the more backward countries where lower wages are paid. This clearly shows the causes and effects. The causes are:
(1) exploitation of the whole world by this country;
(2) its monopolist position in the world market;
(3) its colonial monopoly.
The effects are:
(1) a section of the proletariat allows itself to be led by men bought by, or at least paid by, the bourgeoisie and a section of the proletariat becomes bourgeois.
 
CRITIQUE OF IMPERIALISM  The enormous dimensions of finance capital concentrated in a few hands and creating an extraordinarily dense and widespread network of relationships and connections which subordinates not only the small and medium, but also the very small capitalists and small masters, on the one hand, and the increasingly intense struggle waged against other national state groups of financiers for the division of the world and domination over other countries, on the other hand, cause the propertied classes to go over entirely to the side of imperialism.

IMPERIALISM IN HISTORY
Firstly, monopoly arose out of the concentration of production at a very high stage, of monopolist capitalist associations, cartels, syndicatess, and trusts.  Important part these play in present-day economic life.
Secondly, monopolies have stimulated the seizure of the most important sources of raw materials, especially for the basic and most highly cartelised industries in capitalist society: the coal and iron industries.
Thirdly, monopoly has sprung from the banks.
Fourthly, monopoly has grown out of colonial policy.  This intensification of contradictions constitutes the most powerful driving force of the transitional period of history, which began from the time of the final victory of world finance capital.

SOCIALISM- Competition becomes transformed into monopoly. The result is immense progress in the socialisation of production. In particular, the process of technical invention and improvement becomes socialised.
This is something quite different from the old free competition between manufacturers.  Concentration has reached the point at which it is possible to make an approximate estimate of all sources of raw materials of a country and of several countries, or of the whole world.  Skilled labour is monopolised, the best engineers are engaged; the means of transport are captured—railways in America, shipping companies in Europe and America. Capitalism in its imperialist stage leads directly to the most comprehensive socialisation of production; it, so to speak, drags the capitalists, against their will  into some sort of a new social order, a transitional one from complete free competition to complete socialisation. Production becomes social, but appropriation remains private. The social means of production remain the private property of a few. The struggle is between the cartels and outsiders, i.e., the capitalists outside the cartels.  There is compulsory submission to monopolist associations.



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