The U.S. control of Central America has meant the exclusion from these markets of Japanese goods. As well as supplying cheap labour to the U.S. bosses the Central American countries rely on the U.S. for almost all of their exports and imports. In the U.S. itself the Japanese are allowed access to no more than 33% of the car market.
A consensus has been created throughout U.S. society which identifies the Japanese as the cause behind the U.S. recession. This has included some of America’s unions and liberal Democrats like Jessie Jackson. One consequence has been a rising number of physical attacks on Asians in general.
The economic war between the U.S. and Japan has already warmed up. For American bosses it means bigger profits as they convince American workers that it is the Japanese rather then capitalism that are responsible for unemployment. Alliances between bosses and workers against another country mean little or no effective class struggle at home. This in turn means low wage rises and crap working conditions. The U.S. is one of the few countries where workers saw a real reduction in wages in the 1980’s.
It is this sort of prejudice that European bosses hope to build on through the E.C. Most European countries have already seen it on a national level. In Ireland a milder version is currently being pushed through the Buy Irish ad’s. Our interests as workers lie with the workers of other countries, not our gombeen green bosses.
The Essay on Japanese American internment of 1942
The Japanese American internment which took place during the second world war referred to the relocation and confinement of over 100,000 people who were Japanese Americans or nationals of Japan. These people were taken to housing facilities which were commonly known as the war relocation camps. This internment was carried out selectively in the United States with most of those who were interned ...
The effects of imperialism on different countries varies, for many of the underdeveloped countries it means that their exports are permanently underpriced and their imports overpriced as they have no control over access to international markets. It means an enormous burden of dept to the imperialist countries in return for outdated or inappropriate technology and military equipment.
It means a government whose sole role is to ensure the country stays profitable for the imperialists with low wages, tame or non-existant unions and few safety laws. It commonly means famine and death as proxy wars are fought between imperialist powers there.
IMPERIALISM KILLS
Imperialism’s casualties in the last decade have included 100,000 Iraqi’s, more as a show of force then anything else, 3 million Ethiopians in a country which exported food throughout the famine, 50,000 Nicaraguans in an effort to topple a government less disposed to American interests. Were it not for the death and destruction it would be funny that the West poses as part of the solution. The imperialist powers are not part of the solution, they are the problem.
The sheer level of destruction guarantees some resistance to imperialism wherever it is found. Commonly this takes place through the mechanism of national liberation Movements like the Provos or Sandanistas. Such movements attempt to unite sections of the bosses with the workers in order to throw out imperialism and restructure the economy. This is in the interests of the native ruling class rather then of the imperialist ruling class.
Sometimes such movements take up socialist sounding ideas in order to gain support from the workers. Sometimes as in Cuba or Vietnam this occurred because they allied themselves with a different imperialist power (U.S.S.R) against the imperialist power that they were fighting (U.S.).
The interests of the workers are not central to such movements, whether or not the workers gain is incidental. In practice gains are commonly made by workers in terms of education and health care as the new system attempts to build and maintain an industrial base. This also helps to create loyalty to the new regime.
The Term Paper on Spanish Civil War Workers Socialists Government
Ever since the fall of 1930 when the Spanish Revolution began there has been no surcease of the struggle in Spain. For a long time there was a deadlock of forces, an equilibrium in the tug of war between the property holders and the destitute. Now the equilibrium is being definitely broken. The issue before Spain is either Communism or Fascism. The matter is being fought out not with ballots but ...
Apart from providing markets and sources of cheap raw materials, imperialism has another plus for the bosses. It is used in the imperialist countries to get workers to side with their bosses against the people of other countries. Workers identify with the soldiers of ‘their’ imperialist armies who share their language and traditions rather then with the workers of the oppressed nation. Anarchists in these countries have to be able to break this cross-class unity in order to challenge the bosses.
NO WAR BUT THE CLASS WAR?
The nature of the national liberation movements has led some anarchists in the past to make the mistake of arguing that such struggles are not relevant. This is commonly based around the slogan No War but the Class War. During the Gulf War, for instance, British groups like the Class War Federation argued that the outcome of the war was irrelevant and that it was wrong to call for an Iraqi victory as – among other reasons – this meant British soldiers would die.
The logic of seeing the problems in those terms would be to support an imperialist victory once the war was in progress. Those groups who worried about the number of British Squaddies who would die had their wish fulfilled, only a very few were killed. In Iraq this meant enormous casualties due to indiscriminate bombings and the deliberate destruction of basic infrastructure.
The position taken by the rest of the left was at least as absurd. Nearly all the revolutionary left called for Victory to Iraq. In calling for victory to Iraq the implication was that it was an Iraqi victory and not an American defeat which was important. Yet Saddam, even if he had beaten the Americans, would have just as quickly rejoined their camp or that of one of the other imperialist powers. The Iraqi ruling class might have wished for a free hand in the region but their interests clearly lay in stable relations with one or the other imperialist powers.
WHO CAN DEFEAT IMPERIALISM
The only force in the region capable of dealing a lasting blow to imperialism are the workers and peasants who live there. Rather then supporting the Iraqi ruling class (however ‘critically’) or worrying about British squaddies it was these forces socialists should have supported. The Trotskyist presentation of Saddam as the objective anti-imperialist was rubbished by the unfolding of events. The war ended when the Iraqi ruling class and the imperialists both recognized that their common enemy, the working class in Iraq, had moved centre stage.
The Term Paper on British Imperialism In India
All the leadership had spent their early years in England. They were influenced by British thought, British ideas, that is why our leaders were always telling the British "How can you do these things? Theyre against your own basic values.". We had no hatred, in fact it was the other way round - it was their values that made us revolt." -Aruna Asaf Ali, a leader of the Indian National Congress. ( ...
This happened when uprisings broke out throughout Iraq. Although they had a religious or nationalist base these uprisings saw the formation of workers councils (shoras) in many of the larger cities. Saddam was left his elite divisions and allowed by the U.S to fly helicopters against the uprisings throughout Iraq. The combination of the Iraqi army and the deals stitched up by the nationalist leaders of the uprising meant that the Iraqi ruling class has regained control of the situation. Saddam the objective anti-imperialist performed his age old function of guaranteeing stability and oil for the imperialists.
The lessons of the Gulf war can be applied generally. No bosses government whether a dictatorship as in Iraq or the more liberal regime of the Sandanistas can be really described as anti-imperialist. When faced with a choice between the revolutionary anti-imperialism of the workers or compromise with imperialism they will always choose the latter. Workers in those countries have two enemies, their own ruling class and the imperialist powers. Neither of these are potential allies, even in the short term. The role of a revolutionary organization in those countries is to build towards a situation where the workers and peasants can take control.
The same applies in general to national liberation movements like the ANC or the Provos. The idea that the working class should work for national liberation first and then emerge to assert its own class interests shows no understanding of the nature of such movements. Only an anarchist revolution can hope to end imperialist exploitation of a country.
The Essay on Causes of British Imperialism
Throughout history, countries have expanded their empires to create the largest and most powerful on the globe. Napoleon and Alexander the Great had two of the most controlling empires ever created, and Great Britain’s in the early 1800’s was another of the best. During this time, many empires started expanding to make greater and more commanding kingdoms. Great Britain greatly grew in ...
WHOSE SIDE ARE YOU ON?
Does this mean we say there is no difference between the national liberation movements and the imperialists. It does not. Our problem with such movements is that they offer no solution to the problem of imperialism. It is however imperialism that is the problem. Therefore anarchists have to defend the right of such movements to fight against imperialism, particularly anarchists in the imperialist country itself.
Anarchists in Britain, for example, have to take a clear position on Ireland. The British ruling class in the past has been able to defuse opposition internally by uniting all classes against ‘common enemies’ in Argentina and Belfast. As long as the British working class supports the British government on Ireland or does not see it as an important issue it will find it more difficult to take up independent working class politics elsewhere. British anarchists must be prepared to defend the Provos against the state by pointing out that they are not the real problem. They must be prepared to call for troops out no matter how difficult this might be. Concretely this means arguing to British workers that it is ‘their’ state and not the Provos that is the cause of the conflict in Ireland.
In Ireland anarchists have to be not only willing to defend the Provos but capable of putting forward a real solution to the conflict. The Provos today have no solution beyond calls for UN involvement and the demand for talks with the British government. We need to be able to build a movement that in the South is able to undermine the basis of the southern clerical state. In the North we have to be able to unite Protestant and Catholic workers with them in the fight for an all-Ireland workers republic. This will be not only in opposition to British imperialism and its loyalist puppets but also to the green nationalist bosses.
On a wider level we are entering a new period of imperialism. The break up of the cold war world will mean a rush by the victors for new spheres of influence. Ireland is bound to be involved on the fringes of this through the E.C. and the U.N. Both these bodies are dominated by the big imperialist powers.
The U.N. is a talking shop for the ruling class of the world. It gives a veto to the victorious imperialist powers of World War II and so it can only act in their interests. The E.C. is designed to act in the interests of the European bosses. It provides them with a super state through which they hope to compete with the rival imperialists of Japan and the U.S..
The Essay on The Troubles In Northern Ireland
The troubles in Northern Ireland Many people only have a limited idea about what these infamous “troubles” in the North of Ireland really were. Hopefully this article will shed some light on the matter. In the past the vast majority of violent acts and attitudes of discrimination towards minority groups have been based on blacks or the Jews, often leaving religious wars to the olden day Europe. ...
We need to expose the real nature of the U.N. and build opposition to any Irish involvement in ‘peacekeeping’. Our class is international, our allies are the workers of all countries, our enemy is the Buy Irish green bosses.
