John Hobson’s ‘Imperialism: A study’ and ‘The Economic Parasites of Imperialism’ place this 19^th century writer into a class of economic writers who were critics of imperialism. However, a critical analysis of his works shows inconsistency. Nevertheless, his position on imperialism is very clear in this work: ‘Imperialism: A study’. In this   article of John Hobson, I would like to look at how he developed his thought to conclude that financial imperialism was ill-intended, and further those non-European nations and the European superpowers will at one time in the future suffer because of the imperialism perpetrated by the European superpowers. Even though he is the first writer of the works on imperialism, John Hobson seems to lack objectivity in his work. He criticizes the same European nations that he claims he is a nationalist. Although after reading his work, one can make their own considerations and judgments, a lukewarm position is evident in some of his comments. He seems not to have taken a clear stand in some instances, and this brings about some elements of inconsistency in the work.

Hobson in this work seems to be one who can convince masses that all colonizers were capitalist imperialists with hidden agenda, and I believe this is where he got it all wrong. This is because, in the implementation of imperialist policies, there were sympathizers among some interest groups who were driving the forces of imperialism. Where Hobson got it wrong is by viewing all the imperialists as capitalist imperialists with ill intentions. His binocular of looking at the whole imperial thing seems to have given him a vivid rather than a clear image. He sees all of them as being driven by the power of financial capital and the zeal to amass wealth, get raw materials for industries, obtain cheap labor and market their finished goods. However in the colonization process, though to a great extent the ideas Hobson talked about are evident, we are able to appreciate the philanthropists in the group. Again, his prediction is very empty of what would happen in the post-cold war days like the present.

One would still wonder why Hobson and some of his fellow economic imperialism theorists focused so much on ‘oil capitalism’, and failed to foresee the role of the imperialist powers in combating international crimes in the post-imperialism era. For example in examining the recently concluded post-cold war of the US in Iraq, one will be completely convinced that the oil that Hobson emphasizes on was not the real cause of the war.In other terms, oil was just one of the many effects of the war. This is proof by history, and is in contradiction to Hobson’s’ observation, because here history is proving to us that capitalist imperialism is not just a matter of oil independence, but that security is a big concern.

However, Hobson seems to be clear about the role of the media, and how it was instrumental in the perpetuation of imperialist policies. On the other hand, he argues about the financial and the oil motive of the superpowers, but he seems to forget even the very dominant slogan in imperialist powers like the USA that is simply said ‘God save America’. Even presidents of the United States have echoed this statement not once. The portion of the imperialist groups that spent their time spreading Christianity and campaigning for the end to slavery, have been forgotten by Hobson.

Hobson’s observation about the ‘political significance of imperialism’ does not seem to hold water in the post-cold war period as he predicted. For example, in March 16^th, 2006, the government of the United States released an official document that confirms the commitment of America to lead by deed in the promoting a state of calmness in the world.

Looking at these works by Vladimir Illyich Lenin (1870-1924): ‘Imperialism, The Highest Stage of Capitalism’ and ‘Imperialism and the Split in Socialism’, 1916, he starts by showing agreement with the work of Hobson (1902), ‘Imperialism: A study’. This writer is in actual sense, the one who translated this Hobson’s book to Russian. In his works, he looks at capitalism through the perspective of the European powers that want to use their might to divide the world markets. He talks of the rivalry between the economic superpowers in their scramble for, and partitioning of colonies in the world. The cartels and the monopolistic trusts of production in relation to their rapid growth and concentration of production in one part of the earth seem also to concern him.Nevertheless, his work that came up in the wake of World War1that he called ‘Imperialism, The Highest Stage of Capitalism’ seem to go beyond the work of Hobson of 1902.

Anyone who has read Lenin’s comments that he made about Hobson would wonder why Lenin himself decided to write a book on imperialism. Nonetheless, Lenin provides the answer thus: to present a ‘composite picture of the world’s capitalist system in its international relationships’. In this work, Lenin argues that imperialism is a new order and a developed stage of capitalism. However, this notion can be objected to. The objection to this is that contrary to what Lenin argues, only a small, conditioned development of the process of the forces of production is possible to the forms of production that have been determined historically.

In his work, Lenin argues that monopoly finance capitalism is capitalism that is “dying” and that, at the highest peak of imperialism, capitalism was into its way “to socialism”. This appears to be a false portrayal of the theories of Marxist of “inevitable collapse” of capitalism. His observation that, a higher system is being created by monopoly does not seem to hold water since these nations underwent the forces of monopoly, and capitalism still exists. This work of Lenin seems to be poorly argued. He believes that Marx’s theory of capitalism of internal contradictions happened before World War 1 in Germany and he presents back up points for these statistics. However, a close examination of his numbers contradicts all what Lenin is saying. His artistic explanation comes out like some sort of socialistic propaganda or some kind of conspiracy theory which is out of control. Recent historical happenings have proved Lenin totally wrong. His prediction of a socialist revolution in Germany has not yet been realized. By himself, he invalidated his thesis. He only seems to have led the Russian revolution. Irony comes out here clearly because Russia should have been the last place that this revolution could have happened, owing to its economic backwardness at the time of publishing the book. This presents a kind of a socialist rhetoric that has failed to translate into reality.

When he was writing the book, Lenin aimed at giving imperialism a scientific and concise explanation. He also wanted to discuss the thoughts of Karl Kautsky, the Social Democratic Party leader of Germany, that he led many of the people of his political party to the side of the ruling population. Relating these to the advocacy of social justice, one will find Lenin’s argument against Kautsky being invaluable. A new form of capitalism that exists nowadays is totally different from the one Lenin predicted. It composes of going to congress, shifting from board to board, going for cabinet positions and many other forms, but it still seems to exist and act in the form of monopoly capital.

Antonio Negri and Michel Hardt’s ‘Empire’ is, according to the authors, a work of philosophy. The aim of this work of philosophy is to abstract from the order of singular events of the daily life to an order more advanced of the world. Some of these advanced attributes of the order of the order of the world are a political sovereignty with developed structure, global markets and world circuits of production. Nevertheless, the way ‘Empire’ portrays this world order is a disruption of the present world organization.

Lucidity seems to run through the chapters of this work of philosophy. It is to some extent truethat globalization has indeed laid foundations of a society that is planetary, basing on the principles of social justice, social equality and economic justice. This can be attributed to the assumption that capitalism, though it has a characteristic barbaric nature, has laid the material foundation of socialism. In the same sense, the changes in the working class composition and the organization of production over the past century have opened new opportunities and established different conditions for the struggle over the forces of oppression and exploitation. Also, as per the prediction of the authors, means of discipline for workers that are sophisticated have been discovered and are being implemented by today’s leaders.

The entire argument of ‘Empire’, however, lacks the evidence of a theoretical need to concern world progressive struggles like the movement for global justice. There is a loss of direction, which should have pointed to the fight over war and imperialism. The potential for local struggles to mushroom over regions and nations has not been given the attention that it deserves. The working class’ contribution to the struggle for a more comfortable world has been given little consideration. The book also has failed to recognize the point of building national and international revolutionary parties.

It is not surprising that the backbone of an empire is its attribution of the death of ‘Imperialism’. Nonetheless, we can connote that, in the new world order, contemporary world events can be understood better from a framework developed from imperialism. With this fact then, the political strategy proposed by Hardtz and Negri is seen to fail terribly. The authors too, see other theorists as having been reluctant to recognize the major changes in global power relations but rather concentrate on the oppression of the minority states by the imperialist superpowers.

Negri and Hardt argue that an ‘Empire’, has a virtual center. At the same time, they claim that it has no center. This is meant to portray that some set of capacities and power is possessed by an empire and that these powers and capacities exist nowhere, and at the same time everywhere. In other words, it has no single or central place.The author’s argue that ‘Empire’, is a ‘permanent state of emergency and exception justified by an appeal to essential values’. Negri and Hardt insist that their Empire is a coherent, structural constitutionalism that is in a state of permanence exception which cannot form a legal system that is self-enclosing. This they argue strongly, though their formulation is succinct and powerful. The notion of defining Empire as having potential to form a system with a stable constitutional order is baseless and problematic. It is hard to bring power into being, determine how international law will be interpreted in regard to this power, and even suspend the power when you no longer need it. If the world’s system of power can be defined and described as an empire, unless because of the overwhelming concentration of military, financial and diplomatic power that is in American hands. It is ironical, however, that Negri and Hadtz refute that America holds imperialist power. In the evolution of this theory, the prophecy by the authors has failed to happen because, in the current world order, America is the custodian of imperialist power. Upper-case Empire, as argued by the authors, cannot exist in a state-based imperialism.

However, it is good that these authors accept that the US ranks the highest in possession of international power hierarchy. The problem is that they at the same they disregard the aspects that make the United States a super power. For example, they refute the metaphysical aspect of the United States can be considered as an aspect of the power they hold. Their argument that the worlds’ omnipresent poor and have-nots can merge to constitute an empire seem a loss of direction.

William Langer’s ‘Diplomacy of Imperialism’ reflects a work of philosophy that is warped with the artistic style of Hitler. The work was written by this intelligent gentleman and published in 1935. It was published the same year by The Council on Foreign relations. The author talks of the ‘outburst of expansive’ activity that emerges triggered by the great imperial powers of the world including Britain, France and Germany. He refers to this expansive form of capitalism as imperialism. He is unlike his Neo-Marxian counterparts like Rudolf Hiferding and Rosa Luxemburg, showing some deviation from Neo-Marxism. By the time he writes, the Neo-Marxists had already developed their Neo-Marxist theories. He holds that imperialism is nothing more than the last stage of capitalism coined by excessive saving and accumulation of capital; that this leads to devise a way of looking for new markets and seeking of new opportunities for investments.

When we look at this theory from a pure economic point of view, we appreciate the difficulty of breaking it down to the logic of the theory that is brought about by accumulation.With this perspective of the economist of looking at imperialism, one would consider England, for example, to have had free trade in the days of imperialism. By this time, England exported manufactured goods and machinery to all the four corners of the earth. She prepared the continents for an industrial revolution and, as a result repositioned herself to implement imperialist powers. However, it is now clear that imperialism is explained from a general theory directed towards international relations. Therefore, with this concept, this term loses meaning and loses weight to become nothing less of just a theoretical concept.

The Marxism and Neo-Marxism theories discussed in this paper agree with each in a great extent. The early theorists that have developed and discussed the theories argue mostly from the point of view of the world order of imbalance in the distribution of capital and markets. The accumulation of capital in one part of the world and lack of the same in another part seems to affect their theories about capitalist imperialism to a great extent. However, they are proven wrong as days go by, and their theory evolves from the Marxism to the Neo-Marxism period. Most of these early thinkers saw imperialism with the eyes of racism. They considered racial struggle to be the force behind the development of imperialism even to become a political policy. However, in the modern times, it has been proved otherwise, with assertive nationalism being considered the driving force of imperialism. Most of the predictions of these theorists about the direction that imperialism would have taken have come out to be just theoretical concepts.

Works Cited

Langer, William, L. The diplomacy of imperialism: 1890-1902. New York; London: Knopf, 1935. Print

Lenin, Vladmir, I. Imperialism and the split of socialism. Moscow, 1972. Print.

Lenin, Vladimir, I. Imperialism: The highest stage of capitalism. Australia: El Faro printing, 2008. Print.

Hobson, John, A. Economic parasites of imperialism. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2010. Print.

Hobson, John, A. Imperialism: A study. New York: George Allen & Unwin, 1902. Print.

Negri, Antonio and Hardt, M. Empire. Harvard: Harvard University Press, 2001. Print.

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