A Theory of Global Capitalism: Production, Class and State in a Transnational World, by William I. Robinson. Baltimore : John Hopkins University Press, 2004. Pp. 200.
William Robinson has added another important book to his growing body of work. His new effort, A Theory of Global Capitalism, argues that globalization is a new stage of world capitalism. Unlike his previous explorations into the affects of globalization on particular countries and regions, this book has a larger canvass, developing a framework to understand change and conflict in today’s world. Robinson’s focus is on three key issues, transnational production, transnational capitalists and the transnational state.
The first chapter argues globalization is a new era characterized by the rise of transnational capital. The transnational economy is based on global assembly lines where production is coordinated across borders and where capital flows unrestricted from one country to another. Information technologies laid this foundation by giving capitalism greater mobility that allowed it to establish a worldwide command and control structure. These changes led to key differences between the old national industrial economy and the new global economy. The old international system was based on national production linked to the world through export trade. But today’s world system is based on “the rise of globalized circuits of production and accumulation.” (p.11) This means transnational corporations produce anywhere, employ everywhere and sell in markets spanning the entire world. Transnational capitalists coordinate this vast network of relationships assuming leadership in the world economy from which they dictate global patterns of accumulation.
Robinson has contributed important insights into the development of the transnational capitalist class (TCC). He argues that a new global capitalist class has emerged with the integration of finance and production through foreign direct investments, cross border mergers and acquisitions and global assembly lines. Hence these transnational capitalists emerge as the dominant fraction of capital that, “imposes the general direction and character on production worldwide and conditions the social, political, and cultural character of capitalist society.” (p. 48) But Robinson is careful to draw attention to the continued existence of national capital, showing that many of today’s political and economic struggles reflect the competition between national and transnational capitalism. Both have their own forms of organization and patterns of accumulation. As with the first chapter, the author offers a range of economic data to support his views. Here Robinson examines the growth of transnational corporations, cross border mergers and acquisitions, the global interlocking of directorates, strategic alliances and the rise of Third World transnational elites.
The second chapter ends with the argument that a new dominant (or hegemonic) bloc has emerged, creating new globalized capital-labor relations. This bloc has its own political project carried out by agencies such as the IMF, World Bank and WTO, as well as national governments that work to adjust their economies to the demands of global capitalism. The author also points out that a unified vision of the global system has not been developed and that “conflicting solutions to the problems of global capitalism based on the historical experiences of their regional systems” lead to debates and differences within the TCC. (p. 76)
Chapter three offers what is perhaps the most controversial section of Robinson’s theory, the emergence of a transnational state (TNS). The author challenges the idea that states by nature have a national form, arguing that nation-states arose from a particular epoch of capitalism with historically determine capital-labor relations. These relations, when replaced by new forms of accumulation, produce new institutions through which class power is expressed. Robinson links three key ideas: first, that the TCC has brought into existence institutions that express their authority; second, that the nation-state is being transformed and absorbed into larger global structures; and lastly the transnational states “institutionalizes the new class relation between global capital and global labor.” (p. 88). As Robinson shows, the transnational state is not a “fully functioning political, administrative and regulatory structure…there is no clear chain of command and division of labor” (p.117). Rather it is emerging from the “political consequence of the social practice and class action of the TCC” (p. 121) as it attempts to build a new economic, social and political framework. It takes form not as a preconceived plan, but from the process of historic change itself.
One problem for Robinson’s transnational state theory is the role of military force, a key element of state power. His argument is that since the TCC controls the US government it follows all policies are on behalf of the global TCC, including US military goals. This fails to see a split between national and transnational factions of US capitalism and fails to recognize unilateralism as the counter hegemonic project of the nationalist wing of US capitalism. If history proceeds by two steps forward and one step back, then Bush is certainly one step back from globalism. This is easy to see in the widespread rejection of the war in Iraq by globalist regimes throughout the world who certainly do not see US leadership on their behalf. The problem is no functioning definition for translateral politics has been developed. There are clear lines of difference between transnational and national economic practices. In the transnational economy global capitalist share leadership and control and have many institutions through which they set goals and settle disputes. But transnational capitalists outside the US have no institutional means to affect US military policy. There are multilateral links developed in the old international system, but these lack the deep integration seen in the economic realm. The US state still maintains sole leadership of the US military. But wouldn’t a transnational state by nature have integrated and translateral political governance where global military policy would be worked out in such world institutions as the UN? It seems there is still a disconnect between the advanced state of economic global integration and the emergence of a fully developed world political structure.
In the book’s last chapter Robinson looks at many of the inherent contradictions within global capitalism as well as possible alternatives. The problems of over accumulation, global poverty and the social crisis are analyzed through a Marxist framework that the author shares with many critics of globalization. Robinson’s books are always informed by the work of Antonio Gramsci. Once again he puts the Italian Marxist to good use in a discussion of the battle over hegemony within the TCC, as well as examining the anti-capitalist social movements. Although this section is not as original as the preceding chapters there are still excellent insights into the current stage of political struggles and debates. Central to the author’s view is that “Social conflicts linked to the reorganization of the world economy will lie at the heart of world politics” (p. 175). He states that although the TCC has been unable to sustain hegemony in civil society, neither have social movements been able to offer a viable alternative. Here Robinson calls on popular movements to breakout of their local and isolated oppositional struggles to build a transnational movement and transnationalized class consciousness.
Robinson’s book is a major achievement in theorizing globalization and perhaps the best defense of transnational capitalist class theory to date. Whether or not one agrees the book is a must read presenting a powerful theoretical thesis that needs to be contemplated and responded to by all who consider globalization a key question for our time.
Jerry Harris
Global Studies Association, Chicago
notes:
He is the author of A Faustian Bargain: U.S. Intervention in the Nicaraguan Elections and American Foreign Policy in the Post-Cold War Era (with Kent Norsworthy); Promoting Polyarchy: Globalization, US Intervention, and Hegemony; Transnational Conflicts: Central America, Social Change and Globalization; A Theory of Global Capitalism; and co-editor with Richard Appelbaum of Critical Globalization Studies.
William Robinson has added another important book to his growing body of work. His new effort, A Theory of Global Capitalism, argues that globalization is a new stage of world capitalism. Unlike his previous explorations into the affects of globalization on particular countries and regions, this book has a larger canvass, developing a framework to understand change and conflict in today’s world. Robinson’s focus is on three key issues, transnational production, transnational capitalists and the transnational state.
The first chapter argues globalization is a new era characterized by the rise of transnational capital. The transnational economy is based on global assembly lines where production is coordinated across borders and where capital flows unrestricted from one country to another. Information technologies laid this foundation by giving capitalism greater mobility that allowed it to establish a worldwide command and control structure. These changes led to key differences between the old national industrial economy and the new global economy. The old international system was based on national production linked to the world through export trade. But today’s world system is based on “the rise of globalized circuits of production and accumulation.” (p.11) This means transnational corporations produce anywhere, employ everywhere and sell in markets spanning the entire world. Transnational capitalists coordinate this vast network of relationships assuming leadership in the world economy from which they dictate global patterns of accumulation.
Robinson has contributed important insights into the development of the transnational capitalist class (TCC). He argues that a new global capitalist class has emerged with the integration of finance and production through foreign direct investments, cross border mergers and acquisitions and global assembly lines. Hence these transnational capitalists emerge as the dominant fraction of capital that, “imposes the general direction and character on production worldwide and conditions the social, political, and cultural character of capitalist society.” (p. 48) But Robinson is careful to draw attention to the continued existence of national capital, showing that many of today’s political and economic struggles reflect the competition between national and transnational capitalism. Both have their own forms of organization and patterns of accumulation. As with the first chapter, the author offers a range of economic data to support his views. Here Robinson examines the growth of transnational corporations, cross border mergers and acquisitions, the global interlocking of directorates, strategic alliances and the rise of Third World transnational elites.
The second chapter ends with the argument that a new dominant (or hegemonic) bloc has emerged, creating new globalized capital-labor relations. This bloc has its own political project carried out by agencies such as the IMF, World Bank and WTO, as well as national governments that work to adjust their economies to the demands of global capitalism. The author also points out that a unified vision of the global system has not been developed and that “conflicting solutions to the problems of global capitalism based on the historical experiences of their regional systems” lead to debates and differences within the TCC. (p. 76)
Chapter three offers what is perhaps the most controversial section of Robinson’s theory, the emergence of a transnational state (TNS). The author challenges the idea that states by nature have a national form, arguing that nation-states arose from a particular epoch of capitalism with historically determine capital-labor relations. These relations, when replaced by new forms of accumulation, produce new institutions through which class power is expressed. Robinson links three key ideas: first, that the TCC has brought into existence institutions that express their authority; second, that the nation-state is being transformed and absorbed into larger global structures; and lastly the transnational states “institutionalizes the new class relation between global capital and global labor.” (p. 88). As Robinson shows, the transnational state is not a “fully functioning political, administrative and regulatory structure…there is no clear chain of command and division of labor” (p.117). Rather it is emerging from the “political consequence of the social practice and class action of the TCC” (p. 121) as it attempts to build a new economic, social and political framework. It takes form not as a preconceived plan, but from the process of historic change itself.
One problem for Robinson’s transnational state theory is the role of military force, a key element of state power. His argument is that since the TCC controls the US government it follows all policies are on behalf of the global TCC, including US military goals. This fails to see a split between national and transnational factions of US capitalism and fails to recognize unilateralism as the counter hegemonic project of the nationalist wing of US capitalism. If history proceeds by two steps forward and one step back, then Bush is certainly one step back from globalism. This is easy to see in the widespread rejection of the war in Iraq by globalist regimes throughout the world who certainly do not see US leadership on their behalf. The problem is no functioning definition for translateral politics has been developed. There are clear lines of difference between transnational and national economic practices. In the transnational economy global capitalist share leadership and control and have many institutions through which they set goals and settle disputes. But transnational capitalists outside the US have no institutional means to affect US military policy. There are multilateral links developed in the old international system, but these lack the deep integration seen in the economic realm. The US state still maintains sole leadership of the US military. But wouldn’t a transnational state by nature have integrated and translateral political governance where global military policy would be worked out in such world institutions as the UN? It seems there is still a disconnect between the advanced state of economic global integration and the emergence of a fully developed world political structure.
In the book’s last chapter Robinson looks at many of the inherent contradictions within global capitalism as well as possible alternatives. The problems of over accumulation, global poverty and the social crisis are analyzed through a Marxist framework that the author shares with many critics of globalization. Robinson’s books are always informed by the work of Antonio Gramsci. Once again he puts the Italian Marxist to good use in a discussion of the battle over hegemony within the TCC, as well as examining the anti-capitalist social movements. Although this section is not as original as the preceding chapters there are still excellent insights into the current stage of political struggles and debates. Central to the author’s view is that “Social conflicts linked to the reorganization of the world economy will lie at the heart of world politics” (p. 175). He states that although the TCC has been unable to sustain hegemony in civil society, neither have social movements been able to offer a viable alternative. Here Robinson calls on popular movements to breakout of their local and isolated oppositional struggles to build a transnational movement and transnationalized class consciousness.
Robinson’s book is a major achievement in theorizing globalization and perhaps the best defense of transnational capitalist class theory to date. Whether or not one agrees the book is a must read presenting a powerful theoretical thesis that needs to be contemplated and responded to by all who consider globalization a key question for our time.
Jerry Harris
Global Studies Association, Chicago
notes:
He is the author of A Faustian Bargain: U.S. Intervention in the Nicaraguan Elections and American Foreign Policy in the Post-Cold War Era (with Kent Norsworthy); Promoting Polyarchy: Globalization, US Intervention, and Hegemony; Transnational Conflicts: Central America, Social Change and Globalization; A Theory of Global Capitalism; and co-editor with Richard Appelbaum of Critical Globalization Studies.
No comments:
Post a Comment