First Published: Canadian Revolution No. 1, May 1975
Transcription, Editing and Markup: Malcolm and Paul Saba
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By: WORKERS UNITY
a Marxist-Leninist collective in Toronto
One of the most fundamental questions facing Canadian revolutionaries is the “national question”. The debate over Canada’s political economy, its internal class relations, and its position in the world, has historically been, and continues to be, the origin of deep divisions among revolutionaries in this country. Why the stress on this question? What is its relative importance for the revolutionary movement in Canada?
The “national question” does not exist as one question among many of equal importance. In fact it involves: l) fundamental differences in theoretical frameworks, 2) the entire question of what is a dialectical and materialist analysis of the concrete conditions in Canada, and 3) resulting strategies for revolution. It encompasses scores of related “questions” which a revolutionary movement must have answers for: the role of the Canadian state; the actual power of the American ruling class vis-a-vis the Canadian bourgeoisie; the historical analysis of the accumulation of capital and the growth of monopolies in Canada, and so on. It is the combination of the concrete analysis of Canadian conditions, with the universal principles of Marxism and Leninism, that will enable us to determine the character of the revolution in Canada: who are our friends and enemies; what is the correct strategy for the seizure of state power and the construction of socialism in our country. This is the context in which the debate around the “national question” should be seen not as endless academic debate about the nature of reality, but as the scientific basis for changing reality.
Unfortunately the debate is rarely oriented towards determining the precise character and aims of the revolution in Canada. In fact, one of the major problems in resolving ’the national question’ is precisely the lack of a correct ideological and political framework. Discussion centres around varying sets of empirical data, and numerous definitions of what colonialism, imperialism, comprador bourgeoisie and independent bourgeoisie really mean. Comparisons and models are developed with situations that seem analogous to our own. Hence “we are similar to Portugal or Belgium” or “we are similar to any Latin American neo-colony” or “in comparison to the United States, Canada is not an imperialist power” etc. Very few positions begin with Marxist-Leninist science and principle, and proceed to concrete analysis. And so, we have the current endless “colony vs. imperialist power” argument, where moralism about the quality or quantity of oppression is substituted for scientific analysis towards a revolutionary strategy.
This article attempts to put forward a correct theoretical framework for analysis of the concrete conditions of Canadian society. We do not pretend to put forward the definitive position; but we will argue strongly for a Marxist-Leninist approach to solving these ’burning questions’.
For reasons of space, this work will be broken into two parts. Part 1, presented in this issue, will begin by outling the framework developed by Lenin in Imperialism, The Highest Stage of Capitalism, a work which continues to describe the realities and general development of monopoly capitalism in the present era. Secondly, this section will explain the struggles Lenin waged against incorrect ideas of imperialism in his lifetime, as well as the continuation of some of those incorrect lines in today’s movement. Part 2 (in the next issue) will specifically deal with the essential features of Canadian political economy from the Marxist-Leninist viewpoint on imperialism. Included will be an analysis of the positions developed by Tim Buck and the Communist Party of Canada in the I930’s and ’40’s on the question, and an examination of the method used in their approach to the problems.
We hope, through this work, to further debate on this question, and more specifically, to develop the basis for a position on “what is the principal contradiction in Canadian society today?” Although the first part of this presentation may be taken for granted by many revolutionaries, we feel it is nevertheless important to establish a clear theoretical framework of what imperialism is and is not. We welcome responses to this presentation, and hope that additions and disagreements will be put forward to advance struggle, along the lines of resolving fundamental questions first.
Imperialism, The Highest Stage of Capitalism was written in Zurich while Lenin was in exile in 1916. This work presented for the first time, a Marxist view of the development and characteristics of Imperialism on a world scale.
At first the new stage which capitalism was entering after the death of Marx was not clearly understood by many Marxists. A host of new phenomena in all directions began to appearand their underlying principles were not clear; many supposed Marxists began to claim that the new facts had disproved the expectations of Marx, and that revision was necessary (led chiefly by Bernstein and the Second International). The growth of joint-stock capitalism replacing the old personally owned businesses they saw as the ’democratization of capital’. They pointed to the spread of social reforms legislation and to improved standards in western Europe and America as disproof Marx’s contentions of increasing class antagonisms and mass misery. At the same time they were disturbed at other new developments of policy which were happening at the same time, seemingly in contradiction to this spread of ’social liberalism’, at the enormous growth of armaments and militarism, at rising tariff policies, at rapidly increasing colonial plunder raids and violence in all parts of the world; these tendencies they deprecated as contrary to the spirit of the age, and due to a mistaken understanding by the capitalists of their own interests. Such was the opportunist ’liberal-socialist’ outlook up to 1914 with which orthodox Marxism was in conflict.
It was Lenin who first brought out to complete clearness the character of the new epoch as a whole, and laid bare its laws of motion. . . .(R. P. Dutt, The Life and Teachings of Lenin, International Publishers 1934, pp. 67-68.)
In the preface to the Russian edition (printed in 1917) Lenin argues how important a correct understanding of imperialism is to the proletarian forces:
I trust that this pamphlet will help the reader to understand the fundamental economic question, that of the economic essence of imperialism, for unless this studied, it will be impossible to understand and appraise modern war and modern politics. (Imperialism, Progress Publishers, 1968, p. 6.)
In analysing imperialism, Lenin made an exhaustive study of both the historical trends in the development of modern capitalism and the economic and political developments which characterized world capitalism in the early 1900’s. His analysis marked a turning point for the revolutionary movement at that time. He argued that while imperialism was a distinctively new and higher stage in the development of the capitalist system, it nevertheless emerged as the development and direct continuation of the fundamental characteristics of capitalism.
In detailing this special, historical stage of capitalist development, Lenin outlined three fundamental characteristics or features of imperialism. Firstly that imperialism “is the monopoly stage of capitalism”, secondly that it is parasitic, or decaying capitalism, and finally that it is moribund capitalism (or capitalism in transition).
Lenin describes the centralness of monopoly to the imperialist mode of production in the following way:
Economically, the main thing in this process is the displacement of capitalist free competition by capitalist monopoly. Free competition is the basic feature of capitalism, and of commodity production generally; monopoly is the exact opposite of competition but we have seen the latter being transformed into monopoly before our eyes, creating large-scale industry and forcing out small industry, replacing large scale by still larger scale industry and carrying the concentration of production and capital to the point where out of it has grown and is growing monopoly: cartels, syndicats and trusts, and merging with them the capital of a dozen or so banks, which manipulate thousands of million. At the same time the monopolies, which have grown out of free compeition, do not eliminate the latter, but exist above it and along side it, and thereby give rise to a number of very acute, intense antagonisms frictions and conflicts. Monopoly is the transition from capitalism to a higher system.
If it were necessary to give the briefest possible definition of imperialism we should have to say that imperialism is the monopoly stage of capitalism. Such a definition would include what is most important. . .(Imperialism, pp. 82-83.)
In dealing with the most fundamental feature of imperialism, the growth of monopoly, Lenin outlines five essential features which characterize imperialist economy:
1) the concentration of production and capital has developed to such a high stage that it has created monopolies which play a decisive role in economic life.
2) the merging of bank capital with industrial capital and the creation, on the basis of this ’finance capital’, of a financial oligarchy;
3) the export of capital as distinguished from the export of commodities acquires exceptional importance;
4) the formation of international monopolist capitalist associations which share the world among themselves;
5) the territorial division of the whole world among the biggest capitalist powers is completed. ( Ibid., p. 83.)
For Lenin these principal manifestations of the changes from competitive capitalism to monopoly capitalism constituted the ’economic essence’ of the imperialist mode of production.
The second main feature of imperialist political economy which Lenin outlines is the tendency towards stagnation and decay. In some respects the growth of monopolies represents an advance in terms of the increased ability to introduce technical improvements, lower production costs, etc., but, at the same time, monopolies create the material conditions for the elimination of technical and other forms of productive progress. The establishment of monopoly prices, among other things, ensures the retardation and manipulation of production and technology. ’Parasitism’ is reflected also in the growth of a stratum of ’rentiers’– capitalists who take no direct part in production but whose sole activity is the further accumulation of capital from joint-stock ventures, loans and securities, the expansion of their controlling interests in new companies, and financial manipulation. This development of an oligarchy of financial parasites, in turn leads to the development of entire nations playing this same role on a world scale:
Some imperialist countries become transformed into rentier-states. This is the result of an increase in the export of capital, which makes it possible for creditor countries to reap huge profits in debtor countries. The returns on capital invested by Great Britain abroad before the First World War, when her trade was the largest in the world, was five times as much as her returns from foreign trade. At present the United States is the biggest commercial power in the capitalist world. Nevertheless, it is the export of capital and not the export of commodities that plays the decisive role in its economic expansion abroad. (Fundamentals of Marxism-Leninism, Foreign Languages Publ. House, Moscow, 1958, p. 310.)
Lenin argues that the systematic bribing of certain sections of the workers by the financial capitalists is also a sign of the decay of capitalism. Through the export of capital and the accumulation of super-profits, the economic basis is laid for the development of an entire stratum among the working class – a more or less permanent ’aristocracy of labor’. This labor aristocracy is the social basis for opportunism in the working class movement. Since their leadership to the working class consists of arguing the similarity of interests among classes, and ensuring that all struggle stay within the bounds of reforming capitalism, Lenin referred to this strata as ’the real agents of the bourgeoisie in the working-class movement, the labor-lieutenants of the capitalist class.“ As well Lenin noted that imperialism gives rise to divisions within the working class, not simply through the establishment of a labour aristocracy of the upper stratum of the proletariat but throughout the working class as a whole.
One of the special features of imperialism connected with the facts I am describing, is the decline in emigration from imperialist countries and the increase in immigration into these countries from the more backward countries where lower wages are paid. ... In France, the workers employed in the mining industry are ’in great part’ foreigners: Poles, immigrants from Eastern and Southern Europe are engaged in the most poorly paid jobs, while American workers provide the highest percentage of overseers or of the better paid workers. Imperialism has the tendency to create privileged sections also among the workers, and to detach them from the broad masses of the proletariat. (Imperialism, p, 99.)
Finally, capitalism is described as being moribund; that is in the process of dying and transforming. It is a characteristic feature of imperialism as dying capitalism, that it provides not only the material conditions (in terms of large scale socialization of the productive forces and the development of technological innovations) but also the political conditions for the transition to a socialist economic system. Capitalism gives rise to the sharpening of all contradictions, but in particular, the fundamental contradiction between the private appropriation of capital and the ever increasing socialization of production; the contradiction between labor and capital. Moribund capitalism also intensifies the contradiction between the various imperialist countries and financial-capitalist circles in their competition for economic territory, raw materials and redivision of world markets, and in general between the advanced capitalist nations and the colonial and dependent countries.
In studying the intensification of these contradictions under monopoly capitalism Lenin was led to a number of conclusions.
Firstly that the revolutionary crisis would intensify in the capitalist countries, leading to increased class struggle in response to ever increasing exploitation by the financial oligarchy; secondly, that the redivision of the world, and consequently increased oppression and exploitation of the masses of colonial and dependent people, would give rise to “revolutionary storms” in those countries, against imperialism and colonialism; and thirdly, given the rivalry between imperialist countries over markets, spheres of influence, and colonial possession, that wars would be inevitable under imperialism. Lenin concluded that this would give rise to growing unity between the struggles of the proletariat in the capitalist countries and the struggle of the oppressed people in the colonial and dependent countries, to form a world wide front against imperialism. For Lenin imperialism spelled ’the eve of the socialist revolution’ and the ’epoch of doom’ for capitalism.
The extreme sharpening of all the contradictions brings about a situation in which imperialism becomes the eve of the socialist revolution. Capitalist contradictions sharpen to such a degree that the further maintenance of capitalist relations becomes an unbearable encumbrance to the further development of human society. Capitalist relations hinder the further progress of the productive forces; as a result of this capitalism decays and begins to fall to pieces while still alive... (A. Leontiev, Political Economy.)
The purpose of summing up Lenin’s theory of imperialism is, of course, to analyse Canada, and the realities of the present world situation, within this framework. Certainly the Marxist-Leninist analysis of imperialism is not the only theory of imperialism, nor was it in Lenin’s time. Before outlining some of the incorrect theories of imperialism prevalent in the Canadian movement, if is instructive to look at the struggles Lenin waged then, against the major opportunist theories of imperialism at that time.
The most well-known theory of imperialism, in opposition to Lenin’s views, was put forward by Karl Kautsky, a German Social-Democrat and a leader of the Second International. It was on Kautsky’s theory that Lenin centered the force of his critique of “petit-bourgeois anti-imperialism, opportunism, and social chauvinism.”
Kautsky’s theory stressed that imperialism was
a product of highly developed industrial capitalism. It consists in the striving of every industrial capitalist nation to bring under its control or to annex all large areas of agrarian territory, irrespective of what nations inhabit it. (Lenin, Imperialism p. 86)
Furthermore Kautsky stressed that imperialism was not a continuation of the overall development of capitalism, not a new stage of economy, but only a policy preferred by finance capital, in particular an aggressive and colonialist foreign policy. Lenin responded to these arguments in this way:
Imperialism is a striving for annexations – this is what the political part of Kautsky’s definition amounts to. It is correct, but very incomplete, for politically, imperialism is, in general, a striving towards violence and reaction. For the moment, however, we are interested in the economic aspect of the question, which Kautsky himself introduced into his definition. The inaccuracies in Kautsky’s definition are glaring. The characteristic feature of imperialism is precisely that it strives to annex not only agrarian territories, but even most highly industrialized regions . . . because 1) the fact that the world is partitioned already obliges those contemplating a re-division to reach out for every kind of territory, and 2) an essential feature of imperialism is the rivalry between several great powers in the striving for hegemony, i.e., for the conquest of territory, not so much directly for themselves as to weaken the adversary and undermine his hegemony. (Imperialism, p. 85.)
Lenin points out further that if it is chiefly a question of the annexation of agrarian countries by industrial countries, then the role of the merchant (in the industrial countries) is put in the forefront.
He emphasized that with the rise of monopolies and the development of finance capital, the financiers were the central power in monopoly capitalism; dominant over the merchant capitalists. Lenin continues by pointing out Kautsky’s response to Cunow, an apologist for German imperialism:
Kautsky’s reply to Cunow is as follows: “imperialism is not present-day capitalism; it is only one of the forms of the policy of present day capitalism. This policy we can and should fight, fight imperialism, annexations, etc” The reply seems quite plausible but in effect is a more subtle and more disguised (and therefore more dangerous) advocacy of conciliation with imperialism, because “fight” against the policy of the trusts and banks that does not affect the economic basis of the trusts and banks is mere bourgeois reformism and pacifism, the benevolent and innocent expression of pious wishes. Evasion of existing contradictions, forgetting the most important of them, instead of revealing their full depth – such is Kautsky’s theory which has nothing in common with Marxism. (Imperialism, p. 87.)
Kautsky essentially rejected the view that imperialism is the political-economic system of developing monopoly capitalism. For Kautsky imperialism had nothing to do with the mode of production, but existed simply as an aggressive and expansionist foreign policy. Kautsky also advanced the theory of “ultra-imperialism” or the possibility of the removal or gradual disappearance of contradictions (the root of contention and rivalry) among the capitalist powers and as a result the elimination of imperialist wars. World peace would be possible with imperialism still intact, It was these erroneous views of Kautsky’s which formed much of the theoretical basis for the opportunism of the Second International, which Lenin waged ceaseless struggles against both before, during and after the First World War.
We have outlined the Leninist theory of imperialism, and the incorrect views which Lenin fought against. The next question: what is the theoretical basis for various incorrect views on the nature of the Canadian economy and its position in the world to-day?
The Canadian revolution must obviously be made by forces within this country. The particularities of the Canadian situation must be carefully analyzed, and a strategy developed based on our own concrete realities. To be consistent with Marx’s basic law of development, “internal forces are the basis of change, external forces are the conditions of change.” But, in order to grasp the laws of development of Canadian political economy, it is essential to situate Canada vis-a-vis developments in monopoly capitalism/imperialism as a world system. We must understand the contradictions shaping the present world situation, in order to grasp the forces at work in any particular situation. It is primarily this lack of a world perspective, coupled with a failure to grasp the fundamental characteristics of imperialism, which is at the root of the subjective and mistaken analysis of both the vehement “nationalists”, and many “anti-nationalists” (primarily the various Trotskyist sects).
The starting place in determining strategy must always be an analysis of present conditions on a world scale. Why? Because the class struggle in the age of the decline of imperialism is no longer a national question, but an international one. Proletarian revolution and proletarian dictatorship are no longer strictly national question, confined to the political economy of a single nation. The class struggle is an international one against imperialism in all its forms.
This is never the framework used by the petit-bourgeois nationalists in developing their positions; but, neither is it that of the trotskyists, despite all their clamour about “international revolution”. Both accept the Kautskyite view that imperialism is chiefly the annexation or colonization of agrarian or semi-agrarian areas by large industrial states, and that it consists mainly of an aggressive and expansionist foreign policy. Imperialism is not seen as the direct continuation of the system of capitalist production and exchange, but rather, as a policy that some capitalists (or capitalist nations) might engage in.
In the traditional “nationalist” argument, therefore, Canada is not an “imperialist country” for any of a number of reasons: “we do not posses any colonies,” or “we do not directly threaten other countries miliarily”, or “our direct investment in Third World countries is not very significant,” and so on. This defense of Canada as a non-imperialist country completely ignores the fundamental question of the mode of production and the level of the productive forces. It concentrates entirely on Canada’s “imperialism” as a foreign policy vis-a-vis Third World Countries. What is this but Kautsky’s supposed Marxist arguments about imperialism revisited?
Tim Buck, leader of the Canadian Communist Party for many years, criticised this position from the starting point of Lenin’s theory of imperialism, in Canada, the Communist Viewpoint:
But, argue some people, Canada cannot be characterized as an imperialist state because she doesn’t possess or exploit any colonies.
That attitude is based upon a fundamentally erroneous conception of the basis, the political character, and the driving forces of finance-capitalist imperialism. Possession of colonies is not the test of whether or not any state is imperialist – the sole test is the structure and the level of development which characterizes its national economy. Lenin showed that finance-capitalist imperialism is a specific historical stage of imperialism. Just as industrial capital typified a distinct and higher stage than merchant capital out of which it evolved, so finance capital typifies a higher and distinct stage of development than the free competition, with separation of bank and industrial capital, out of which it evolved. The merger, or the marriage as it is aptly described, was a necessary accompaniment of the rise of monopolies, and the monopolies that it made possible have speeded up the concentration of investment capital into huge impersonal aggreggations which press ever more heavily upon the direction of government policy and for possibilities of safe and profitable investment abroad.
The rise of finance-capitalist imperialism divided the countries of the world into two groups: a small number of rich imperialist states – exploiting the non-imperialist states as well as the colonies and striving to make them increasingly dependent. What Lenin emphasized concerning colonies was that “the territorial division of the whole world among the greatest capitalist powers is now completed.” That fact helped to illustrate the maturity of imperialism – not to define which were imperialist states.
The Trotskyists in fact share the same basic incorrect assumptions about “Canadian Imperialism” that the “nationalists” do. Again, they isolate one aspect which characterizes imperialism to prove that Canada is an imperialist power. They detail Canada’s role in imperialist alliances such as NATO and NORAD. They quote statistics on how much direct investment Canadian businessmen have in Latin America and the Caribbean. These phenomena are undeniably important as far as defining what kind of nation Canada is in a world context.
In 1969 Canada had over $8 billion dollars invested in 61 Third World countries, 82% of which was put into Latin America and Caribbean countries. (The bulk of Canada’s long term direct investment abroad was in the U.S. and The United Kingdom – $2.8 billion and $.6 billion respectively.) (Statistics Canada, December 1971, Canada’s International Investment Position, p. 10.)
But, foreign investment is by no means the only, or the central feature which characterizes imperialism. But it should not be surprising that the Trotskyists, too, ignore the forces and nature of production in “proving” Canadian imperialism. For the Trotskyists, there are no fundamentally different historical conditions within various countries which give rise to struggles of differing characters. Their “myopic” strategy is applied with little variation, whether the country is a super-power, a dependent capitalist country, an outright colony, or a feudal monarchy.
In most '“nationalist” arguments, foreign ownerehip is at the center of an analysis of Canada’s internal political economy. Just as the “lack” of foreign direct investment in Third World countries is the proof that Canada is not imperialist, so also, the amount of foreign investment and control of Canadian industry proves that we are “imperialized”. Thus, we become a colony or neo-colony, the object of U.S. Imperialism’s expansionist designs, like so many other “underdeveloped” countries.
What is not grasped here is that “foreign ownership” is not specifically a “Canadian problem”, or a feature unique to Canadian political economy. It is undeniable that the U.S. dominates certain key sectors of the Canadian economy, and exerts considerable influence in Canada’s economic, political, and cultural life. The nationalist viewpoint, however, does not take into account overall changes in the imperialist system since the Second World War, or the fundamental characteristics of imperialism at a particular stage of its development. In fact, foreign ownership (and specifically American ownership) is a “problem” in most advanced capitalist countries. As for back as 1916, Lenin pointed out that imperialism does not simply strive to annex agrarian territories, but also, because of the contradictions between competing circles of financial capitalists, strives to control and annex other large industrial states. This phenomenon should not be interpreted as exclusively a relationship between imperialist countries and the Third World, but one that exists between and among imperialist countries.
A brief look at the world since 1945 will show that the U. S. has increased its control over sections of other capitalist countries’ economies considerably.
Direct private investment by the United States in Canada as of 1964 rose to $13,820 million dollars but direct Canadian investment in the United States totalled $2,284 million dollars (a ratio of six to one). And direct American investments in Europe reached $12,067 million dollars, while those of Europe in the United States amounted to $5819 million dollars (a ratio of two to one, which had changed to 2.6 to one by the end of 1966). (Pierre Jalee,Imperialism in the Seventies, Third Press, New York, 1972, p. 77.)
Canada has the highest percentage of U.S. ownership, however it is clear that U.S. domination is a general trend in other “advanced industrialized” countries as well. Furthermore, in many European countries, in Australia, and in Japan, this fact has given rise to numerous bourgeois and petit-bourgeois nationalist movements. But, one would be hard put to argue that these countries have been transformed into colonies or neo-colonies. In fact, the relationship is qualitatively different from that between a neo-colonial country and an oppressor imperialist nation.
This confusion arises out of an empirical and superficial treatment of Canada’s relationship to other countries. In fact, Canada is analyzed only in relation to the United States, and not in relation to the imperialist system as a whole. Theoretically, this fails to grasp the essence of imperialism as a political economic system in which competition and domination arise logically out of capitalist relations of production. “Foreign ownership” is a measure of the success and power of competing capitalisms in acquiring significant shares of each other’s markets and resources.
A related argument (of the same school as the last one) arises in analyzing Canada’s current economic crisis. The acute problems facing the Canadian working class presently are seen as the result of the U.S.’s economic recession “spilling over into Canada”. The root cause of the problems is not sought in the fundamental contradictions within the Canadian economy which give rise to crises, or in the generalized crisis of monopoly capitalism/imperialism as a whole. The reality that overproduction, unemployment, inflation and recession are problems rooted in the capitalist mode of production, is conveniently overlooked. (Such an analysis would lead to far different strategic conclusions!) Rather, the total explanation is provided (again by looking only at the relationship to the U.S.) by “unequal” trade relations, export quotas and tariffs, and unemployment in U.S. dominated industries.
Like much of the nationalist argument, there is little that is materialist or dialectical in this approach. There is a consistent refusal to study the internal development of the capitalist mode of production in Canada from a Marxist-Leninist viewpoint of imperialism. In the name of “concrete analysis of concrete conditions”, we are given a subjective examination of the economic crisis as an “imported problem” ’ little help to those workers who struggle daily against the effects of that crisis, and who need to understand its basic causes. The role of the banks.
The power and influence of the banks in the Canadian economy is widely misunderstood in “left circles” today. In (what we refer to as) the “equal areas of influence” theory, the banks are treated as an isolated sector of the economy, one in which Canadian capitalists have significant control. The utilities, transportation, and communications sectors are viewed in the same way, while the “really important” sectors of manufacturing and resource extraction are controlled by the U.S. What is not understood is that the banks are not just another sector of the economy (as Statistics Canada would have us believe). Within the system of modern-day imperialism, and specifically within Canadian monopoly capitalism, their power is very significant. It is the banks, in merger with industrial capital, who form the financial capitalist ruling cliques characteristic of modern imperialism.
Monopoly has sprung from the banks. The banks have developed from modest middleman enterprises into the monopolists of finance capital. Some three to five of the biggest banks in each of the foremost capitalist countries have achieved the “personal link-up” between industrial and bank capital, and have concentrated in their hands the control of thousands upon thousands of millions which form the greater part of the income of entire countries. A financial oligarchy, which throws a close network of dependence relationships over all the economic and political institutions of present day bourgeois society without exception ’ such is the most striking manifestation of this monopoly. (Lenin, Imperialism, p. . 116 >
The “equal areas of influence” theory (basically a quantitative approach) misses the entire point. The growth of the productive forces, the concentration of production in capital, gives rise to the dominance and control of the finance capitalists at a certain historical stage. As Lenin pointed out, this phenomenon has occurred, with the development of monopoly, in all major capitalist countries. The role of the banks has completely changed from that of “merchant middlemen” to being the controlling arm of finance capitalism. Even the briefest of examinations of the boards of the top five banks in Canada will reveal that the “personal link-up” which Lenin spoke about, of industrial and banking capital merging to form finance capital, and of powerful capitalist associations based on this, is very much in evidence, (this phenomenon will be looked at in greater detail in Part 2 of this presentation.)
So far, we have primarily criticized the incorrect theory behind various positions on the “national question”. But, the basic outlines of our own developing position are to be found within this critique. The article in the next issue will expand on that position and the analysis behind it. In that article, we will analyze much more extensively the main features of Canadian political economy, and the strategic conclusions we draw from that analysis. The following is a brief summation of that position.
1. Canadian society is primarily characterized by: a) a developed capitalist mode of production, and consequently a class structure in which the overwhelming majority of the population is working class; b) a high degree of monopolization of the means of production; c) a concentration of power and wealth in the hands of a financial capitalist ruling clique, representing the merger of banks and industrial capital; and d) an established bourgeois-democratic regime.
2. It is apparent also that foreign (U.S.) capital is very strong in manufacturing and resource extraction in Canada; Canadian capitalists dominate in the major banks, transportation, communication and utilities, and some branches of manufacturing industries.
3. Canadian finance capitalists are increasing their investments in Third World countries (often in alliance with U.S. imperialism) as well as in “advanced industrialized” nations.
It is from these realities (which obviously require detailed proofs and further analysis) that the strategic conclusions must be drawn. The character of the revolution, that is, its strategic goals and class alliances, varies according to the level of development. The Communist International, founded by Lenin in 1919, distinguished between the struggles in different parts of the world in this way;
The international proletarian revolution consists of a series of processes, differing in character and in time: purely proletarian revolutions; revolutions of a bourgeois-democratic type which turn into proletarian revolutions; wars of national liberation, or colonial revolutions. It is only when this development reaches its conclusion that the revolutionary process emerges as the world proletarian dictatorship.
The unequal development of capitalism, accentuated in the epoch of imperialism, has given rise to a great variety of types of capitalism with differing degrees of maturing in different countries, and to a great variety of conditions of the revolutionary process peculiar to each. It follows with historical inevitability that the proletariat will seize power in a variety of ways and with varying degrees of rapidity, and that in a number Of countries it will be necessary to pass through a transitional stage to the proletarian dictatorship. It follows further from this that the construction of socialism will assume different forms in different countries.
The varied conditions and roads of the transition to the proletarian dictatorship in different countries may be reduced schematically to the following three types: in highly developed capitalist countries (the U.S., Germany, England, etc.), with powerful productive forces, a high degree of centralization of production, relatively insignificant small scale enterprise, and an old and well-established bourgeois-democratic political regime, the principal political demand of the program is the direct transition to the proletarian dictatorship. . . .
. . . Countries at a medium level of capitalist development (Spain, Portugal, Poland, Hungary, the Balkans, etc.) where semi-feudal relationships largely survive in agriculture although the material prerequisites for the construction of socialism are present in some degree, the bourgeois democratic revolution not having been completed: in some of these countries it is possible that the bourgeois-democratic revolution will develop more or less rapidly into the proletarian revolution, while in others there may be types of proletarian revolution which will have many of the tasks of the bourgeois-democratic revolution to accomplish. . . .
Colonial and semi-colonial countries (China, India, etc.) and independent countries (Argentina, Brazil, etc.): ... In these countries the struggle against feudalism, against precapitalist forms of exploitation, the consistent pursuit of the agrarian peasant revolution, and the struggle against foreign imperialism and for national independence are of decisive importance. Here the transition to the proletarian dictatorship is as a rule possible only through a series of preparatory stages. . . .
In still more backward countries... the struggle for national liberation is the central task. . . . (Jane Degras, ed., The Communist International 1919-1943 (documents), Volume 2, Oxford University Press, London, 1960, p. 505-7.
We will argue, in Part 2 of this work, that the revolution in Canada will be of a proletarian character, as described in the first example given by the Comintern. We do not argue, however, that the struggle in all capitalist countries is exactly the same, or that Canada has no contradiction with imperialism, in particular with U.S. imperialism. It would be sheer blindness to ignore such obvious realities. But, unlike the “nationalists” and the Trotskyists, we would argue that this contradiction with U.S. imperialism constitutes one aspect of the struggle in Canada, but that fundamentally, the Canadian revolution will be proletarian in character.
A non-dogmatic analysis of the world situation (and Canada) takes into account that it is constantly developing and changing.
Since Lenin first wrote about imperialism, and since the Comintern documents were drafted, there have been many significant changes. The position of the Chinese Communist Party, as articulated by Vice Premier Teng in his United Nations address in April 1974, analyzes today’s world in this way:
Judging from the changes in international relations, the world today actually consists of three parts, or three worlds, that are both interconnected and in contradiction to one another. The United States and the Soviet Union make up the first world. The developing countries in Asia, Africa, Latin America and other regions make up the third world. The developed countries between the two make up the second world.
. . . The developed countries of the second world, even though some may exploit and oppress others, at the same time . . . are in varying degrees controlled, threatened or bullied by one superpower or another. Some of them have in fact been reduced by a superpower to the position of dependencies under the sign board of its so-called “family”. . . .
We would argue that Canada is, in fact, such a “second world” country in the present world situation. A revolutionary strategy must pay careful attention to Canada’s role in the world – as an ally of the major imperialist powers, and as a dependent power which, secondarily, has contradictions with imperialism – in addition to a thorough analysis of the concrete situation within Canada.
See Part 2 next issue.