Global social movements

ICOPEC 2019 ‘If Globalism is Dead—Long Live What?’ Marmara University Istanbul, Turkey 25-28 June 2019 ‘De-globalisation and the Return of the Theory of Imperialism’ Stavros Mavroudeas Professor (Political Economy) Dept. of Social Policy Panteion University e-mail: [email protected] web: http://stavrosmavroudeas.wordpress.com Abstract The globalisation hypothesis (i.e. the argument that modern capitalism has once and for all discard the nation state and modern capitalism became a truly unified ‘global village’) was overwhelmingly popular since the 1990s. This was coupled with the expansion of a multifaceted theoretical trend that rejected previous analytical tools and purported that it ushered new ones, tailor-made to the new ‘globalisation era’. Especially within Political Economy, the globalization discourse rejected the theory of Imperialism (that emphasized antagonisms and the role of the national economy) for a theory of global interconnectedness (emphasizing co-operation and deterritorialization). However, the course of events of the real world radically diverged from the stylized beliefs of the globalization discourse. Particularly, before and increasingly after the 2008 capitalist crisis, antagonisms along national lines and military conflicts proliferated. These developments signify the necessity of a return to the classical Marxist theory of Imperialism as the appropriate analytical framework to grasp the political economy of the international system.

1997

PART I HISTORICAL STRUCTURES 2 Neo-colonialism, Modernisation and Dependency Global economic pressures Domestic tensions Geo-political relations Modernisation theory Dependency theory v Vl Contents 3 Crisis and Restructuring: The New International Division of Labour Material capabilities: global Fordism Neo-colonial economic relations Economic nationalism in the Third World Changing geo-political relations 51 Critical theory: diversity and micro-studies Gender and development 'Dependency associated' development theory Postimperialism and world system theories PART II GLOBALISA TION Contents Vll 6 Globalisation 114 The sociology of globalisation Roland Robertson: world compression and intensification of global consciousness David Harvey: Time/space compression Anthony Giddens: Time/space distantiation The economics of globalisation 121 A global market discipline Flexible accumulation through global webs Global financial 'deepening' 7 Global Regulation Capital-state relations: global governance and the internationalisation of the state Capital-labour relations: the new global world of work Core-periphery relations The politics of exclusion PART III THE POSTCOLONIAL WORLD

2019

Globalisation is what we make of it; why economic globalisation is optional and how post 2008 we are seeing a potential shift away from the hegemonic rhetoric and the beginnings of a post globalised world. Nation states have been the centre of political authority since the signing of the treaty of Westphalia in 1648 (Bowen, 2018; 2). Yet over the past 35 years the common discourse has become one of globalisation and the demise of the nation state, and its authority, especially in terms of the economy (Creveld, 2000; 5). For this reason and due to the relatively short length, this essay will focus on economic state authority, looking in particular at the power of Western states. During the late 1980s and early 1990s hyper-globalists such as Ohmae (1989) and Reich (1991) began to suggest that improvements in technology, especially in communication and transportation, were having damming effects on the power and the role nation states play in international politics (Hay, Lister, and Marsh, 2006;172-173). They further argued that labour, goods, and capital move across state boarders with ease, co-operations being able to move where it suits them best which makes the world seem borderless (Ohmae, 1996). However, this view soon came under fire from more sceptical voices, the likes of Hirst and Thompson (1999) suggesting that state power had not hugely changed; this view has since been repeated by several other theorists (see Hay, Lister, and Marsh, 2006; 174). This essay will position itself somewhere between these two arguments, suggesting that there has been an erosion of state authority-especially to large co-operations-but that this is not down to the material reality of technological advancements, faster transportation and better communication, but is instead down to its rhetorical construction. This essay will start by looking at the inaccuracies of the classic business school theory of globalisation; it will then move on to look at how globalisation theory has been constructed and how this has led to a transfer of state power to non-state actors.

Neoliberalism: a Critical Reader , 2005

Individuals, States and International Organizations are material subjects upon which contemporary globalization has been acting, although these subjects have no equivalent influence on the same process. One can say that we are in the middle of a great transition process -and such statement can be true, although it does not enlighten if and how we can govern globalization. Aware of the present impossibility of beginning to build a fair global order, we must enquire if it is not at least possible to step into that direction, some like as it happened after the French Revolution when, abstractly speaking, subjects were "liberated" and turned into citizens. We should spend at least one century to have political results close to such principle. Would it not be plausible to consider the liberation of States brought about by the "international revolution" between 1989-1991 -which dismantled both blocs, Western and communist, along with its ideological divisions -a first step on an analogous path? Would it not be better to have a "bad" international regime than no regime "at all"? The main objection against this hypothesis is very strong: it is inevitable that, in a bad regime, sooner or later one or more States would impose themselves, compelling the world to an imperial structure in which the level of liberty and individual benefits would be established by the "central empire". Such situation would cause much dissatisfaction, bearing the conditions of a new war. This argument, taken to extreme, could be an evidence of an "unexpected consequence" of globalization: its crisis -that is, all that can be shown to be in crisis by way of globalizationwould not be the decisive factor that explains the fall down of political-economical and juridical contradictions built for an old world, all of them obsolete and harmful nowadays? It would result from it that not only globalization is unable to "build" a new world, but also that it is the agent that liquidates the old order, as if what has happened after 1989 were nothing less than a great Post-War during which the challenge has been beginning to rebuild, or better, to build a new world.

Key Words internationalization, neoliberalism, trade opening, social dumping, states and markets s Abstract This chapter reviews the issues at stake in current public and scholarly debates over the impact of changes in the international economy on domestic politics and society. Over the past two decades, there have been dramatic increases in the flow of portfolio capital, foreign direct investment, and foreign exchange trading across borders at the same time as barriers to trade in goods and services have come down. These changes raise many new questions about the effects of trade and capital mobility on the autonomy of nation-states and the relative power in society of various groups. The first signs of realignments within and between political parties of both the left and the right over issues of national independence and trade openness suggest a rich new terrain for political inquiry.