Interrogating "Newness": Globalization and Postcolonial Theory in the Age of Endless War

Abstract

Recent events in Afghanistan and Iraq lead us to return once again to Lenin's fundamental question in his essay Imperialism as a Special Stage of Capitalism: We ask, is there under capitalism any means of removing the disparity between the development of productive forces and the accumulation of profit on the one side, and the division of colonies and spheres of influence for finance capital on the other side-other than by resorting to war? (98).1 Clearly, there are many ways to approach Lenin's question, posed as European powers were bringing their forces together for a cataclysmic war. It is important to remember, for instance, that he had written on this subject almost twenty years earlier in his essays On the So-Called Market Question and A Characterisation of Economic Romanticism. In these essays, he had undertaken a defense of Marx's theory of accumulation and had tried to demonstrate the expansive nature of capitalism. For Lenin, capitalist states could not exist without foreign markets, and expansion outside national limits was an essential condition for growth and accumulation. In this scenario of ever-expanding capital, war remained an inextricable part of the capitalist project. There have, of course, been many critical responses to Lenin's theory of imperialism, and one could claim that the stress he placed on intercapitalist rivalries is no longer appropriate in the present age;