The deep allegiance of the Euro-Amerikan workers to this new Leader and his New Deal movement was born in the feeling that he truly spoke for their class interests. This was no accident. Nations and classes in the long run get the leadership they deserve.
J. Sakai - Settlers
While it's not wrong to highlight the monopoly of finance capital that banks from the imperial core hold over their Neo-colonies, what I was bringing attention to is that reducing imperialism to just that is missing many of its important aspects.
Lenin himself mentioned 5 essential features, attempting to use less than those inevitably leads to incomplete definitions, for instance, if we consider imperialism to be just monopolistic foreign control over banks, then we would need say that Spain, Portugal and Holland in the 16th-18th were imperialist because they held monopolistic control over their colonies' banking and trading.
And what I would say is the biggest issue with that reduction is that it focuses on one of the consequences of imperialism rather than looking at the source of it, a distinction that is very important for Dialectical Materialism.
And it's interesting to look at China as an example because they are able to fight imperialism precisely by paying attention to all those aspects. (1.) They have laws that makes it impossible for private monopolies to form in their country. (2.) They implemented regulations to reduce impact of that banks can have in the industry, looking to limit the mixing between bank and industrial capital and therefore obstructing financial capital in its inception. (3.) Even having the biggest GDP-PPP of the world China still focus more on production over the exportation of capital. (4.) The limitation of foreign companies in Chinese territory, having laws that prevent them from having complete control of their branches in China. (5.) Chinese investment in underdeveloped countries that undermine the main source of profit of the imperialist core.
It's precisely because China is aware and struggles against imperialism in all these 5 fronts that it is being so successful against it.
Since Marx's works are the core of Marxist theory, and reading "The Capital" would definitely be to long, we should still have a thread at least for both: Wage labour and capital and Value, price and profit
Not exactly, altough the use of financial capital to dominate the "zones of influence" is an important factor, it is just a means through which it works and not imperialism in itself.
Imperialism emerged as the development and direct continuation of the fundamental attributes of capitalism in general. But capitalism only became capitalist imperialism at a definite and very high stage of its development, when certain of its fundamental attributes began to be transformed into their opposites,
If it were necessary to give the briefest possible definition of imperialism we should have to say that imperialism is the monopoly stage of capitalism.
But very brief definitions, although convenient, for they sum up the main points, are nevertheless inadequate, because very important features of the phenomenon that has to be defined have to be especially deduced. And so, (...) we must give a definition of imperialism that will embrace the following five essential features:
(1.) The concentration of production and capital developed to such a high stage that it created monopolies which play a decisive role in economic life. (2.) The merging of bank capital with industrial capital, and the creation, on the basis of this “finance capital,” of a “financial oligarchy.” (3.) The export of capital, which has become extremely important, as distinguished from the export of commodities. (4.) The formation of international capitalist monopolies which share the world among themselves. (5.) The territorial division of the whole world among the greatest capitalist powers is completed.
Understanding that according to Lenin: "Imperialism emerged as the development and direct continuation of the fundamental attributes of capitalism in general." We must then remember what are some of the fundamental attributes of capitalism in general, and for that let's take a look at Marx's "Value, Price and profit"
The surplus value, or that part of the total value of the commodity in which the surplus labour or unpaid labour of the working man is realized, I call profit. The whole of that profit is not pocketed by the employing capitalist. The monopoly of land enables the landlord to take one part of that surplus value, under the name of rent,
On the other hand, the very fact that the possession of the instruments of labour enables the employing capitalist to produce a surplus value, or, what comes to the same, to appropriate to himself a certain amount of unpaid labour, enables the owner of the means of labour, which he lends wholly or partly to the employing capitalist — enables, in one word, the money-lending capitalist to claim for himself under the name of interest another part of that surplus value, so that there remains to the employing capitalist as such only what is called industrial or commercial profit.
Rent, interest, and industrial profit are only different names for different parts of the surplus value of the commodity, or the unpaid labour enclosed in it, and they are equally derived from this source and from this source alone.
So understanding the connection between both works we can reach the conclusion that Imperialism is when, trough the 5 main points that Lenin summed up, the capitalist class of the main countries are able to extract not only resources or labour from their colonies, which already happened in the previous phase of capitalism, but are able to extract chunks of the actual surplus value being created in those countries.
This is how one can understand how, for instance, the U.S. managed to reach 30% of the world's economy in the 60s, because after it's decisive victory in the second imperialist war it was able to colonize the entire Free™ world and consequently extracted parts of the surplus value produced in the entire world which flowed straight to the U.S. Banks.
For those struggling to find the time with everything going on, try to make an effort to find the time to read, for it is precisely in periods of crisis that Marxist theory is most relevant.
I trust that this pamphlet will help the reader to understand the fundamental economic question, that of the economic essence of imperialism, for unless this is studied, it will be impossible to understand and appraise modern war and modern politics.
Special attention has been devoted in this pamphlet to a criticism of Kautskyism, the international ideological trend represented in all countries of the world by the “most prominent theoreticians”, the leaders of the Second International
This ideological trend is, on the one hand, a product of the disintegration and decay of the Second International, and, on the other hand, the inevitable fruit of the ideology of the petty bourgeoisie, whose entire way of life holds them captive to bourgeois and democratic prejudices.
To combat these tendencies is the bounden duty of the party of the proletariat, which must win away from the bourgeoisie the small proprietors who are duped by them, and the millions of working people who enjoy more or less petty-bourgeois conditions of life.
Also:
It is precisely the parasitism and decay of capitalism, characteristic of its highest historical stage of development, i.e., imperialism. (...) out of such enormous superprofits (since they are obtained over and above the profits which capitalists squeeze out of the workers of their “own” country) it is possible to bribe the labour leaders and the upper stratum of the labour aristocracy. And that is just what the capitalists of the “advanced” countries are doing: they are bribing them in a thousand different ways, direct and indirect, overt and covert.
Unless the economic roots of this phenomenon are understood and its political and social significance is appreciated, not a step can be taken toward the solution of the practical problem of the communist movement and of the impending social revolution.
Even a century later this text is still extremely relevant, for imperialism still rules over most of the world, and as such it is a necessary read for anyone trying to understand modern day politics and economics, what the imperial core is doing, and how on the long-term their dependency on financial capital will always be outperformed by the sheer productive power of the AES.
Some think that Leninism is opposed to reforms, opposed to compromises and to agreements in general. This is absolutely wrong. Bolsheviks know as well as anybody else that in a certain sense "every little helps," that under certain conditions reforms in general, and compromises and agreements in particular, are necessary and useful.
To a reformist, reforms are everything, while revolutionary work is something incidental, something just to talk about, mere eyewash. That is why, with reformist tactics under the conditions of bourgeois rule, reforms are inevitability transformed into an instrument for strengthening that rule, an instrument for disintegrating the revolution.
To a revolutionary, on the contrary, the main thing is revolutionary work and not reforms; to him reforms are a by-product of the revolution. That is why, with revolutionary tactics under the conditions of bourgeois rule, reforms are naturally transformed into an instrument for strengthening the revolution, into a strongpoint for the further development of the revolutionary movement.
The revolutionary will accept a reform in order to use it as an aid in combining legal work with illegal work to intensify, under its cover, the illegal work for the revolutionary preparation of the masses for the overthrow of the bourgeoisie.
The reformist, on the contrary, will accept reforms in order to renounce all illegal work, to thwart the preparation of the masses for the revolution and to rest in the shade of "bestowed" reforms.
Repeating something over and over isn’t going to make it true. Throughout this discussion, you’ve consistently avoided engaging with what I’ve said to you and kept misrepresenting what I said. I did not avoid anything here. I simply rejected your misrepresentation of what I said.
Wow, this is literally what I was saying a couple of comments ago. You have "engaged" so much with what has been said to you that you can't even point out the flaws in my comments and can only attempt to reflect your own mistakes at me.
I do not use Fchtean dialectics in diamat, but you’re clearly going to keep repeating that
Well, I am only repeating that because you keep avoiding it. And you might say that you are not using Fichtean dialectics but there is a source that disproves you on that, your own post:
Dialectical Materialism describes the cyclical process of development where an initial thesis is countered by an antithesis, leading to a synthesis that retains aspects of both but transcends them to a new level.
In case you didn't make a quick search (which would be on character), from the very first paragraph on Fichte in Wikipedia:
Fichte was also the originator of thesis–antithesis–synthesis, an idea that is often erroneously attributed to Hegel.
Back to you, on your text linked at the top of this post:
Finally, the principle of the “negation of the negation” describes a spiral of development where a thesis is challenged by an antithesis, leading to a synthesis that incorporates elements of both. (Chapter 8)
A mishmash of an attempt to explain Hegelian concepts using Fichtean logic, the fine work of a true muddler.
So even tough you might claim to not use Fichtean dialectics in diamat, your own writing proves otherwise, I wonder why that is.
There is no point trying to have a good faith discussion with such characters. Bye.
And there it is, the ultimate way of avoiding your mistakes, blaming others and turning away, no surprises here.
If there is anything out of this discussion that I hope has become clear to you, it is that if you are going to write a text on a matter that you don't understand, only to stroke your own ego, be aware that there might be people out there that have actually studied it and will call you out on your mistakes.
Well, that is one way to attempt to avoid a question, but it's definitely not subtle.
I don't think it is necessary for me to add more to the "materialism" side of this discussion considering the amount of times I've pointed out your idealism or agnosticism in this thread, while also leaving a great source on the matter which was Lenin’s “Materialism and Empirio-Criticism”.
But what I am asking you now is about Dialectics and if you could possibly give an example of a Marxist source that actually uses Fichtean dialectics, another example of sophistry was not necessary, it's the other Greek word that you are lacking of.
Considering you continue to try to avoid a crucial part of this discussion, I will repeat the question once more: Why do you use Fichtean “thesis–antithesis–synthesis” in diamat?
Why do you use Fichtean dialectics in diamat? Why use contradictions as “thesis–antithesis–synthesis”? Where did you learn that? Have you found a Marxist author using it like I asked you to link me 3 months ago? Do you just replace Hegelian Dialectics or try to mesh both? If you claim that to you the abstraction of “third order” isn’t the conclusion what is the “synthesis” then?
The fact that you think the word salad you wrote corrected anything really says all I need to know. Simply regurgitating things you’ve read does not constitute genuine understanding of the subject you’re attempting to debate. You are utterly incapable in engaging with an argument you’re presented with in good faith and you use sophistry in lieu of argument. I’ve said all I have to say to you.
I wholeheartedly agree with this sentiment, so much so that it becomes very ironic that it came from you, so I will just give my last point, which was also my first one, but has been skillfully avoided so far.
Why do you use Fichtean dialectics in diamat? Why use contradictions as "thesis–antithesis–synthesis"? Where did you learn that? Have you found a Marxist author using it like I asked you to link me 3 months ago? Do you just replace Hegelian Dialectics or try to mesh both? If you claim that to you the abstraction of "third order" isn't the conclusion what is the "synthesis" then?
I made this point literally on my first comment on this thread, and yet it has never been responded by you. Personally, I think that your muddle might be plenty enough for other matters, but in this one your separation from Marxist Dialectical Materialism is so crystal clear that avoiding it entirely was the only way to maintain your ownership of the truth, so you just looked away and pretended it wasn't there.
So I will end my argumentation by bringing even more attention to what you have avoided the most: Why do you use Fichtean "thesis–antithesis–synthesis" in diamat?
Given that I grew up in USSR, this is the most hilarious thing I’ve been told in a while.
Well, that explains a lot actually. One could argue that growing up in after 60's USSR, a person would be influenced by revisionist ideologies similar to those commonly associated with the infamous western "leftist", one could also argue that the fact that a person who grew up there can't differentiate between agnostic structuralism and dialectical materialism to be an example of a contradiction that played an important part in it's downfall. But here I will do neither for that would only make things more complex, and the if current simpler discussion is already this muddled, nothing would be clear in a more complex one.
You continue to put words in my mouth while ignoring what I’m actually saying. (...) Except I did not claim the other way around anywhere. What I said is that internal contradictions are influenced by external factors.
What you actually said:
many of the contradictions within USSR were a result of the fact that USSR was under siege by the capitalist world.
I am sorry that you dislike the taste of the words in your mouth, but you cannot blame me for they being there, if anything you are trying after the fact to change what you put there in the first place. But it doesn't matter if you try now to claim that "many of the contradictions within USSR were a result of the fact that USSR was under siege by the capitalist world." means the same as " the very real internal deficiencies within communist systems were exacerbated by unrelenting external attacks", the inverted philosophical logic in changing "the external affecting the contradictions" to "the external resulting in the contradictions" makes the difference between yours and Parentis philosophical standpoint pretty clear.
If anything I am the one who could be complaining about words being put in others mouths, for the only thing you could claim that I have been ignoring so far is your continuous attempt to pin on me an argument that the external doesn't influence the internal contradictions, something I've never said in any comment, since it would've been unmaterialistic of me. The only thing that I am ignoring are your attempts of putting words in my mouth, which I shall continue to do so.
As a matter of fact this discussion started with me saying that your (structuralistic) separation between the contradictions and their solutions, leaving the latter to an out of the system third order, due to the misuse of (Fichtean) dialectics was a mistake, which I'm still claiming, except that now I can name more clearly and correctly the source of your mistakes, for as a dialectical materialist I try to study and correct my mistakes about what I'm saying rather than just trying to create the truth.
For a dialectical materialist abstractions are only part of the process of the understanding in our minds, not the conclusion of the process in reality, so if anyone can be blamed for creating a separation that doesn't exist it is only the agnostic of us.
Maybe you should spend a bit of time to actually understand what dialectical materialism is instead of writing pseudo intellectual comments.
Considering that throughout this discussion I have already mentioned multiple times sources of Marxists writers on my points and your mistakes, while all you've brought so far is a misquoted Parenti quote (which I corrected) and your self-given ownership of the truth, I don't think I need to say who is being pseudo something and should spend more time reading rather than writing.
As an example, many of the contradictions within USSR were a result of the fact that USSR was under siege by the capitalist world. The phenomenon Parenti refers to as siege communism.
At first I was shocked of reading this, on a ML instance of all places, to take Parenti's siege socialism and attempt to make it as the result of some kind of struturalistc analysis feels unbelievable, but considering that our discussion has been around the fact that you'd rather use an agnostic analysis over a materialistic one, and that you don't follow Hegelian dialectics and therefore the term "contradiction" means whatever you want, it's then possible to see how one could claim such absurdities.
Let's then actually quote the man himself:
One reason siege socialism could not make the transition to consumer socialism is that the state of siege was never lifted. As noted in the previous chapter, the very real internal deficiencies within communist systems were exacerbated by unrelenting external attacks and threats from the Western powers. (Blackshirts and Reds, p.74)
Parenti literally wrote that the external influences exacerbated the internal contradictions already present within the system, because he was using dialectical materialism and therefore saw first the existence of internal contradictions and then those being affected by the external influences, not the other way around as you claimed.
I need to say, having never had a discussion with a western "leftist" before, even though I somewhat knew what to expect, it is still impressive seeing it first hand how one can believe to make no mistakes and their arguments don't require any proof since they personally own the truth, thinking that repeated enough times anything they say will become real.
Leaving that aside, this recent discussion has left me with a question which I look forward to the answer. If you can dismiss dialectical materialism so easily in favor of a struturalistic analysis, and don't care about Hegelian dialectics, why were you writing about diamat in the first place?
Sorry to bother you again with this conversation after 3 months have passed, but this sentence has come back to me a couple of times during this period due to how poorly it was dealt with by me, and just how it crucial it was to our discussion, so I will now attempt to correct that.
Structuralism differs form Marxism in that it tries to take Marxist advancements on sociology and understanding of the structures of society while refuting the knowability of the internal contradictions within said society, therefore negating the existence of the internal contradiction that lead to capitalism's demise. They claim that the problems of capitalist society are consequences of poor implementation of the system, and consequently believe that with just a change in policies and general politics the problems can be fixed, therefore it is the philosophy which gives birth to reformists.
The way that structuralism achieves that separation from Marxist conclusions is by following the agnostic logic of compromising materialism with idealism, in its specific case, it is Marxist sociology with fichtean subjective idealism, it turns Fichte "thesis-antithesis-synthesis" into reality-ideas-structures.
Out of the top of wikipedia's page on structuralism: "Structuralism is "The belief that phenomena of human life are not intelligible except through their interrelations.". (Things are unknowable but their interrelations are knowable, classic agnostic muddle.)
Out of the top of wikipedia's page on Post-structuralism: "Structuralism proposes that human culture can be understood by means of a structure that is modeled on language. As a result, there is concrete reality on the one hand, abstract ideas about reality on the other hand, and a "third order" that mediates between the two." (reality-ideas-structures.)
Looking back in our discussion, you said "I’m not sure there’s much value separating external and internal conditions though as both ultimately feed into the system.", but to study a thing with Dialectical Materialism it is a necessary step to separate from its current context in order to discover its internal contradictions, which is why in his texts Marx himself does so many abstractions, to allow him to understand the internal movements of things.
The condition that materialism demands of every theory, that it must be put to the test of reality, does not mean that one shouldn't use abstractions when creating said theory, in fact it is quite the opposite if we look at Marxism.
Looking even further into our discussion, we can see that it went through this contradiction where I was attempting to simplify things in order to make more apparent the differences between philosophies, mentioning eggs, water, etc., while you kept complicating matters by bringing more complex and bigger things, such as society, environment, etc., making the discussion less clear and hiding misunderstandings behind big words.
While it did annoy me at the time, which lead to my last comment, I can now understand that it wasn't personal, it is of philosophical necessity that agnosticism muddles things, for when the matter being dealt with is clear and simple, the separation that it tries to create between knowable and unknowable loses all reasoning, which is why we can't just discuss over an egg hatching into a chicken, we must to consider how the "chicken will proceed to eat food, produce waste, and so on. It’s part of the environment, and it has a direct effect on the environment." and therefore we can only comprehend it as a structure and not its specific parts, as Lenin would say, pure muddle.
Having explained all this, it would be incoherent of me to leave the same books recommendations as I did last time, considering we can now see that the divergence comes before we get to dialectics, it is between materialism and agnosticism, I will then recommend a single book on the matter, Lenin's "Materialism and Empirio-Criticism". Even though it was written before Structuralism was a thing, it goes on such great detail on the differences between the logic of materialism and agnosticism in general (and idealism as well) that it provides the best method of understanding what separates those fields of philosophy.
May this help you to comprehend the differences between philosophies and the necessity that materialism has of objective knowledge and it's complete compromise with the truth, Good Luck comrade.
Good answer, comrade 🫡
It is always important to remember to think current situations in a materialistic way, and not fall for the idealistic lie that propaganda alone is able to "brainwash" or "control" people.
Personally, I don't see the point of going in circles in this discussion, so I'll just add my two last notes:
First, I want to again make very clear that my entire point since the first comment has been around the misuse of Fichte's "thesis–antithesis–synthesis" in the place of Hegel's study of "the inner life and self-movement", and the consequences of this. I do want to add the if you know a Marxist author that uses the Fichtean method in a book, please send a link to me, for I would definitely need to read it.
Speaking of books, lastly I want to recommend the books that I read that deal with the dialectical method as I've been describing: F. Engels - "Socialism Utopian and Scientific"; F. Engels - "Ludwig Feuerbach and the End of Classical German Philosophy"; J. Stalin - "Dialectical and Historical Materialism"; M. Cornforth - "Materialism and the Dialectical Method"; Mao - "Five Essays on Philosophy"; V. Adoratsky - "The Theoretical Foundation of Marxism-Leninism"; V.I. Lenin - "Karl Marx"; G. Plekhanov - "Materialismus Militans"; G. Plekhanov "In Defense of Materialism".
Hopefully you will find within yourself to read, and maybe reread, those books so that the methodological mistake you've been making so far may be a thing of the past, good luck on this process comrade.
Actually it's the other way around, the framework is given by the contradictions and therefore internally, while the pressures that affect them are usually external, the combination of both is what leads the system's evolution.
I think I understand pretty clearly what you mean, and it's slightly incorrect, the contradictions are the "tracks" that guide the evolution caused by other forces, and as such the shape of those contradictions is given internally, but the actual "location" within those "tracks" is given mostly externally.
Hence the example from Mao about the egg and the rock, the internal contradictions from the egg are what allow it to become a chicken in the correct temperature (the external influence that leads to that contradiction), but regardless of what you do externally to it, a rock that doesn't have that internal contradiction will never be able to become a chicken.
I wanted to add a classic example of Marxist contradiction, and thought it would be good to use the contradiction between socialized production and private property of the means of production, that contradiction by itself doesn't do anything, only when inserted in the capitalistic mode of production that it will cause so that the production as whole creates poor resource distribution, inequality, crisis, etc., so to try and fix the production as a whole we could fix this one contradiction by struggling to change the private property to socialized property. We would then find that although there were improvements, there are still problems (other contradictions) within the system.
So we can see that the answer to solving the internal contradictions within a system lies inside those contradictions themselves, even with those contradictions being only a part of the whole system and the solution of one not leading to the solution of the whole system.
Well, there are philosophies that study things focusing on its context and interconnection with other structures, that's French Structuralism.
It's only Dialetical Materialism that requires the investigation of the internal contradictions inherent in everything.
I thought our discussion had already run its course, but only now it came to me just how crucial to the understanding of Dialectical Materialism is seeing the value of separating external influence and internal conditions. In my other comment I said it allows for easier study, but that is very far from being complete, it actually is the pivotal abstraction when studying something with Diamat.
Dialectal Materialism gives internally, through its contradictions, the "possibilities" a thing can be. But only after affected by external influences that it actually becomes one of these "possibilities". To go back to the Egg example, the egg holds within himself, through its contradictions, the possibilities of hatching, breaking, rotting, etc.. But which one will the egg actually become depends now of the external conditions.
I also have to add that throughout our discussion it might have lost its focus, but I see the root of the problem being in what is wrote in my very first comment, of trying to use Hegelian Dialectics in the same way as ancient Greek Dialectics, they may share some terminology, but their movement is entirely different.
In short in Greek Dialectics A vs B leads to a C with characteristics of A and B; in Dialectical Materialism A vs B already have characteristics of each (that's why they are contradictory) and they lead to B, with the newer one necessarily (given time) triumphing over the former.
I wouldn't say that changing the contradictions from creators to synonymous with pressures improves the system a lot, I also have to say that there is always value in separating external and internal conditions as they become easier to study as such and greater understanding is always valuable.
And although I don't have the necessary knowledge in thermodynamics to expand on your argument around it, it does fell to me eerie similar to what the material mechanists did centuries ago when they tried to understand the world through the laws of mechanical physics.
You can get a better understanding of thermodynamics by using Dialectical Materialism to study it, but trying to understand diamat by trying to fit in it laws of any branch of physics can lead to grave mistakes.
And I do recommend those books, they go in with way more detail and knowledge about what we are discussing here.
It's a short but very dense read, I'm always impressed by how much knowledge Marx could cram in just a couple of pages. Some highlights: