Capitalism And Colonial Production

Capitalism and Colonial Production (1982) examines the ways in which capitalism has transformed the societies it came to dominate, and the link between colonialism and capitalism. These essays confront the complex of issues, using as material the various countries in Asia. They advance the debate by reconsidering the problems involved by identifying pre-colonial modes of production and by analysing the precise details of the changes wrought by colonial domination. They argue that capitalism does not in these countries co-exist side-by-side with feudalism, but that colonialism has created distinctive forms of capitalism depending for their character on pre-colonial modes of production.

Mahdi Amel (1936–87) was a prominent Arab Marxist thinker and Lebanese Communist Party member. This first-time English translation of his selected writings sheds light on his notable contributions to the study of capitalism in a colonial context.

The first volume of The Cambridge History of Capitalism provides a comprehensive account of the evolution of capitalism from its earliest beginnings. Starting with its distant origins in ancient Babylon, successive chapters trace progression up to the 'Promised Land' of capitalism in America. Adopting a wide geographical coverage and comparative perspective, the international team of authors discuss the contributions of Greek, Roman, and Asian civilizations to the development of capitalism, as well as the Chinese, Indian and Arab empires. They determine what features of modern capitalism were present at each time and place, and why the various precursors of capitalism did not survive. Looking at the eventual success of medieval Europe and the examples of city-states in northern Italy and the Low Countries, the authors address how British mercantilism led to European imitations and American successes, and ultimately, how capitalism became global.

An important building block for further advancing world-system theory, this book considers the theory from the perspectives of global processes and antisystemic movements, feminist theory, and the aftermath of the colonial system. The volume addresses three myths tied to Eurocentric forms of thinking: objectivist and universalist knowledges, the decolonization of the modern world, and developmentalism. All three myths, the authors argue, conceal the continued hierarchical and unequal relations of domination and exploitation between European and Euro-American centers and non-European peripheral regions. In this volume, world-system scholars address these and related aspects of the modern/colonial capitalist world-system. Addressing the myth of universalist knowledge, the volume reminds us that our knowledge is situated in the gender, class, racial, and sexual hierarchies of a specific region in the world-system, while the coloniality of power additionally situates our knowledge. The volume further argues that the postcolonial era retains the hierarchy of colonialism, and the possibility of national development without global structural changes is one of the greatest 20th-century myths. Taking these perspectives into consideration, the contributors examine and help to refine classic world-system theory.

This book examines the history of empire and its influence on capitalism. Taking inspiration from Vladimir Lenin’s essay Imperialism, the Highest Stage of Capitalism, the thoughtful chapters explore how workers and resources in Africa, Latin America, and Asia were exploited by capitalist colonizers. Particular attention is given to the empires of Great Britain, Russia, Japan, the Netherlands, and the United States. This book aims to trace the historical development of capitalism and its reliance of colonialism, and is relevant to those interested in economics, development studies, international relations, and global politics.

In Colonial Capitalism and the Dilemmas of Liberalism, Onar Ulas Ince combines an analysis of political economy with normative political theory to examine the formative impact of colonial economic relations on the historical development of liberal thought in Britain. Focusing on the centrality of liberal economic principles to Britain's self-image as a peaceful commercial society, Ince investigates some of the key historical moments in which these principles were thrown into question by the processes of forcible expropriation and exploitation that typified the British imperial economy as a whole.

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.

This volume looks at how accumulation in postcolonial capitalism blurs the boundaries of space, institutions, forms, financial regimes, labour processes, and economic segments on one hand, and creates zones and corridors on the other. It draws our attention to the peculiar but structurally necessary coexistence of both primitive and virtual modes of accumulation in the postcolony. From these two major inquiries it develops a new understanding of postcolonial capitalism. The case studies in this volume discuss the production of urban spaces of capital extraction, institutionalization of postcolonial finance capital, gendering of work forms, establishment of new forms of labour, formation of and changes in caste and racial identities and networks, and securitization—and thereby confirm that no study of contemporary capitalism is complete without thoroughly addressing the postcolonial condition. By challenging the established dualities between citizenship-based civil society and welfare-based political society, exploring critically the question of colonial and postcolonial difference, and foregrounding the material processes of accumulation against the culturalism of postcolonial studies, this volume redefines postcolonial studies in South Asia and beyond. It is invaluable reading for students and scholars of South Asian studies, sociology, cultural and critical anthropology, critical and praxis studies, and political science.