Challenging New Imperialism, International Revolutions and Emergence of the Middle Class

1. Challenging New Imperialism, International Revolutions and Emergence of the Middle Class Instructor Pacas

2. The Capitalist Industrial Complex in Relation to the Southern Hemisphere • Capitalist Industrial Complex nations desire cost of production to be low and profits of the sale of finish products to be high. • The CIC nations try to acquire the natural resources of the southern hemisphere as cheap as possible.

3. This is usually achieved by the CIC nation offering military aid to elites/military dictatorships that are made the heads of state of nations in the southern hemisphere. OR • Have these polities accrue large debts (IMF or World Bank) with the CIC nation so that they are forced to grant access to natural resources cheaply to the CIC nation(s).

4. Privatization of Natural Resources • Privatization of natural resources in the nations that possess them allow the CIC nations to acquire resources at low cost to them. • By striking reciprocal agreements that will be mutually beneficial to each other, the CIC nation(s) ensure that the owners of the resources in the southern polities are beholden to CIC nations.

5. Threat to this desired relation • Socialism or Communism threatens the CIC nations’ desire to accrue natural resources at low cost because privatization of the resources is non-existent. • Instead resources are communally owned by the entire nation (in theory).

6. The World Viewed In This Backdrop

7. The World after WWI • The end of the war ushered a period of great change around the globe. • Between 1917-1930’s many colonies around the globe engaged in independent native revolutionary movements (INRM’s), aimed at overthrowing the CIC nations yoke of colonialism, end exploitation and establish national autonomy.

8. Revolutionaries Farabundo Marti Mahatma Gandhi’s Salt March Agusto Sandino

9. Revolutions • National independence movements in India (Gandhi), Africa, Middle East and Asia (Ho Chi Minh) or social movements combating U.S. economic exploitation in Latin America (Farabundo Marti, La Matanza and Sandino) have to be seen in this light. • The Russian Revolution. • What were some possible factors that inspired these groups to challenge European and U.S. hegemony and challenge the CIC?

10. Much of the relationship between Europe and its colonies or U.S. and Latin America were intrinsically exploitative and racist. • Colonies were exploited and their population endured many instances of what we would today call human rights violations.

12. Africa • “The laziness of the colored races is kind of genetic burden…Violence was necessary to overcome this natural indolence. Therefore, the Free State’s (Belgian territory in Congo) brutalized the people of the Congo, killing them mercilessly, and torturing those who could not or would not work. Leopold II’s Free State set up the Force Publique, a militia designed to strike terror in the heart of the workforce. If a worker did not work hard, the officer would cut off their hand; one district official received 1,308 hands in one day…” (Vijay Prashad pg. 17)

13. The Congo Human Rights Violation

14. Central America • “After his (popular) election, Araujo ran into a number of severe problems…civil servants wanted higher pay, peasants wanted land reform, and the oligarchy and military demanded that Araujo give no such concessions. Araujo’s flirtation with liberal reforms deeply concerned El Salvador’s wealthy…On December 21… a military coup drove Araujo from power…peasant insurgents decided to revolt in guerilla-like risings…the military systematically hunted down the peasants who had participated in the uprising branded them communists and executed them. This massacre…killed approximately 30,000 peasants.” (Pearcy pg. 44-45)

16. Adoption of Socialism/Communism • Because their exploiters and oppressors were from the CIC many social movements that challenged this exploitation adopted socialist or communist philosophies as a viable means to overthrow the oppressive system imposed on the southern hemisphere.

17. It would be wrong to just look at these movements as challenging European colonialism and U.S. economic exploitation. • Many challenged racist ideology of the colonizers. • Why are these movements not represented this way when discussed in classroom settings?

18. Successful Revolution • The success of Socialist/Communist Revolution in Russia frightened many of the CIC nations. • Military forces were sent by the former Allies (U.S., Great Britain and France) to try to topple the newly established Bolshevik government. • The U.S. sent a total force of 12,000 soldiers in 1918 to Vladivostok and Archangel in Russia. • The invasion was not a success and the Russian Revolution became a global symbol of what proletariat and oppressed could achieve against the CIC.

20. Revolutions Around the Globe post WWI • India Gandhi and New Nationalism 1915-1930 • Russian Revolution 1917-1921 • Iran Nationalist movements 1917-1920’s • Turkey Nationalist movements 1920’s • Arab nationalism 1916-1930’s • Chinese Revolutionary Movements 1911-1920’s • Latin American Revolutionary Movements 1920’s-1930’s. • Etc.

21. Socialist International • Many of these independent native revolutionary movements enjoyed popular moral support from laborers, unions, socialists, communist and anarchist part of the population of the capitalist industrial nations. • Support for these INRM’s was international as well as domestic.

22. Plutarco Elias Calles Chang Kai Shek

23. Common Interests…Internationalism of the Third World • Taking advantage of an attempt by CIC nations of Great Britain and U.S. to shift focus away from their exploitation of the southern hemisphere by shifting global attention to the human rights violations committed against the population of the Congo by Belgium in 1927, nations of the southern hemisphere decided to convene a meeting in Brussels.

24. League against Imperialism 1927 Brussels, Belgium • “Attendants from Asia, Africa and America met in Brussels to discuss their mutual antipathy to colonialism and imperialism and find a way out of their bondage.” (Prashad, pg. 16) • “The event was covertly funded by the Communist International (and believed to be funded by the Kuomintang and the Mexican government of Plutarco Elias Calles)…200 delegates came from 37 states or colonized regions and they represented 134 organizations.” (Prashad, pg. 20)

25. Internationalism and Subject of Discourse • They worked on resolutions that addressed the human rights violations committed by CIC on the population of the southern hemisphere and the domestic population of color within the CIC nations. • Violence on Indian people by British • Jim Crow laws against African Americans • The League against Imperialism criticized the League of Nations preservation of imperialism.

26. Article 22 of the League of Nations • The interests of the colonized have to be curtailed…because the colonized were people not yet able to stand by themselves under the strenuous conditions of the modern world…instead of independence and the right to rule themselves, the league felt that “the best method of giving practical effect to [the principles of self-determination] is that the tutelage of such peoples should be entrusted to advance nations who by reason of their resources, their experience, or their geographical position can best undertake this responsibility…that this tutelage should be exercised by them as Mandatories on behalf of the League.” (Prashad, pg. 21)

27. European Colonies around the Globe

28. Developing the Middle Class-Rise of Consumerism Instructor Pacas

29. Class Struggles • Revolutionary movements whose rhetoric criticized the CIC’s uneven distribution of wealth and class exploitation – had recently experienced a victory in Russia. • The globe was divided between two mutually antagonistic opposites. • One group that had possession of vast wealth at the expense of the other group.

30. Cont’d • The victory in Russia was still fresh in the minds of those challenging exploitation, discrimination, oppression and racism around the globe. • How could the growing disillusion with the ill distribution of wealth, brought about by the capitalist industrial complex, be addressed to try to stabilize the situation?

31. Consumerism • In order to regain and retain stability the government in CIC nations but particularly in U.S. recognized that a few concessions to the demands of labor and other interest groups in society had to be made.

32. Rise of the Middle Class and Consumerism

33. Concessions to try to appease the majority so that the whole population would not be completely alienated. • This disillusion could prove fatal if people took matters into their own hands i.e. ‘Revolution.’ • Voting rights guaranteed for some groups, better working conditions, minimal increase in pay, etc.

34. Increase in pay allowed for spending cash and the ability to purchase cheap mass produced goods in easily accessible markets. • How did the adoption of consumerism transform society and create relative stability?