Challenging Social-Democratic Theories of the Global Political Economy and Updating Theories of Imperialism: The Theory of Bloc Imperialism

摘要

The major theme of this article is a critique of social-democratic conceptions of a ‘globalized world’ in which the nation state is intertwined and interdependent with an independent, mobile multinational capital and transnational cultural, technological, economic and political forces. This leads strategically to the proposal for various multilateral political-economic strategies to seek to ‘tame globalization’. I argue that these conceptions are subject to flawed political-economic analysis. Utilizing an historical materialist framework, distinguished from transnational historical materialism, I deploy and develop the under-utilized and under-theorized Marxist concept of ‘imperialist blocs’. I distinguish it from previous Marxist conceptions of imperialism which have been nation-based. It is argued that institutions such as the European Union are better conceived as the formation of an ‘imperialist bloc’. The positive aspect of this article is to develop this concept as an alternative paradigm to that of ‘globalization’. Whereas globalization emphasizes the integrative nature of current political-economic processes, the concept of imperialist blocs stresses both the integrative, disintegrative and power relations in the contemporary world.View full textDownload full textKeywordsImperialist Theory, Bloc Imperialism, Social Democratic Globalization Theory, European Union, Regions, Monopoly CapitalismRelated var addthis_config = { ui_cobrand: "Taylor & Francis Online", services_compact: "citeulike,netvibes,twitter,technorati,delicious,linkedin,facebook,stumbleupon,digg,google,more", pubid: "ra-4dff56cd6bb1830b" }; Add to shortlist Link Permalink http://dx.doi.org/10.1080/03017601003668746