Globalization and the Invasion of Iraq: State Power and the Enforcement of Neoliberalism

Abstract

A number of critical theorists of capitalist globalization argue that the power of capital is based on a consensus for global neoliberalism generated by a transnational bloc of capitalists, state officials, and intellectuals. I argue in this paper that these theorists minimize the role that coercive state power has played in supporting capital accumulation, and, as a result, they underestimate the continued significance of the nation-state in capitalism. The U.S. invasion of Iraq illustrates the central role of the nation-state in global capitalism in two ways: first, by revealing intense levels of intercapitalist rivalry; and second, by demonstrating the determination of the United States to ensure that neoliberalism is imposed unilaterally, through force if necessary.