Empire of Capital
by Ellen Meiksins Wood
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Book Summary Information
Author: Ellen Meiksins WoodEdition: Paperback
Audio: English (Unknown); English (Original Language); English (Published)
Published: 2005-01-17
ISBN: 1844675181
Number of pages: 182
Publisher: Verso
Book Reviews of Empire of Capital
Book Review: The Bush Doctrine in Capitalist Context
Summary: 3 Stars
"Empire of Capital" is a thoughtful but very slender book on a huge topic -- the history and typology of imperialisms. Written from a Marxist perspective, most of the book deals with relatively esoteric subjects such as the economic origins of Roman imperialism or the efforts by pre-capitalist Holland to monopolize international trade. There's even a sub-chapter on Hugo Grotius! Many readers will skim over these chapters to focus on the last chapter, which deals with the Bush Administration and modern American foreign policy.
Wood's thesis is that American foreign policy protects the interests of global capital in a world of multiple states, each of which has to supply a legal and political framework in which capital can flourish. Our need to dominate and influence the domestic institutions of sovereign states around the globe -- including our allies in Europe and Japan -- explains the presposterous size of the U.S. military and our propensity to leap into foreign entanglements that have no clear connection to U.S. interests. Washington uses "military theater" as a means to show the world who's boss and to deter other countries from building up enough military power to challenge U.S. hegemony.
Like many Marxists, Wood is on to something. The U.S. government does want to create a world of democratic capitalist states. It opens up foreign markets, funds opposition parties in "transitional" countries, and pursues "regime change" (also known as "transformational diplomacy") in countries such as Venezuela or Zimbabwe whose domestic politics and economic policies displease us. For more than 50 years, Washington has believed that the U.S. national interest depends on the domestic behavior of foreign states, not just their international behavior. The reasons why we reject traditional norms of sovereignty and non-interference are complex, but obviously include the belief that unimpeded flows of capital are good for U.S. corporations and the capitalist global economy.
But -- again like many Marxists -- Wood neglects important non-economic factors that also drive American policy. She writes as if domestic politics, traditional geopolitics, democratic values, concern about terrorism, and sheer hubris do not shape policy in important ways. She never analyzes the motivations of real policymakers, or acknowledges how fun and satisfying it is to be a 30-something Republican working on the NSC staff and playing kingmaker in foreign countries. Bizarrely, she doesn't even acknowledge that the invasion of Afghanistan was a response to 9/11 -- she proposes instead that it was nothing more than a ruse to insert U.S. forces into oil- and natural gas-rich Central Asia. If she has evidence for this, she never presents it. In fact, the U.S. closed its bases in Uzbekistan in 2005 rather than abandon criticism of that country's human rights record -- thus exploding Wood's theory about the origins of the war. Facts are awkward things.
Seeing Wood misconstrue something as simple and well-known as Afghanistan makes it hard to take on faith her sweeping generalizations about more distant phenomena such as Roman imperialism. As a political scientist, she may be more at home weaving grand theories than weighing historial evidence. At the end of the day, "Empire of Capital" is too sketchy and abstract to be fully persuasive. Lacking a detailed analysis of the global economy or the dynamics of U.S. policy, the book ends up only suggesting, not validating, a framework for interpreting imperialism in the 21st century. Other Marxists must now fill in the details and show that the framework is fruitful.
Readers interested in pursuing these themes should read Andrew Bacevich's superb "American Empire," which has a far surer grasp of American diplomatic history.
Summary of Empire of Capital
What does imperialism mean in the absence of colonial conquest and imperial rule?
Capitalism makes possible a new form of domination by purely economic means, argues Ellen Meiksins Wood. So, surely, even the most seasoned White House hawk would prefer to exercise global hegemony in this way, without costly colonial entanglements. Yet, as Wood powerfully demonstrates, the economic empire of capital has also created a new unlimited militarism.
By contrasting the new imperialism to historical forms such as the Roman and Spanish empire, and by tracing the development of capitalist imperialism back to the English domination of Ireland and on the British Empire in America and India, Wood shows how today's capitalist empire, a global economy administered by local states, has come tom spawn a new military doctrine of war without end, in purpose or time.
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