Re: globalization

Andre Gunder Frank wrote:
> NO. that may be so for thiose who like/support ''capitalism" and have
>  taken up its flag as thjeir own to run with. But it is not so for
> thos who are againsr capitalsim, from Marx and his followers to
> ''non-=scioentific"socialists and humanists of all kinds. But for all
> it is an ideology to be pro or con as well as sjpposedly a real
> thing. I think none of the above gunder frank
>
> On Wed, 18 Jun 2003, GlobalCirclenet wrote:
>
>
>> Date: Wed, 18 Jun 2003 12:24:34 -0600 From: GlobalCirclenet
>> <webmaster@globalcircle.net> To: franka@fiu.edu,
>> tacer@alumni.bilkent.edu.tr Cc: Luke Rondinaro
>> <larondin@yahoo.com>, wsn@csf.colorado.edu, Barry Gills
>> <gills@hawaii.edu>, franka@fiu.edu Subject: Re: globalization
>>
>>
>> In a nutshell then, may we say Capitalism as an ideology revolves
>> around blind faith in the market, and in recent centuries decades
>> it drives the powers that be to dismantle centuries of socially
>> imposed restraints and ethical norms?
>>
>> --paul, webmaster http://globalcircle.net peace and liberty,
>> sustainability and justice
>>
>> get daily Global NetNews Summary - email to:
>> globalnetnews-summary-subscribe@yahoogroups.com OR
>> globalnetnews-summary-subscribe@lists.riseup.net *********** REPLY
>> SEPARATOR  ***********
>>
>> On 6/18/2003 at 10:37 AM Andre Gunder Frank wrote:
>>
>>
>>> you write below
>>>
>>> In my opinion, it does not really matter if globalisation has
>>> been present for 150 years, 500 years, 5000 years or Neolithic
>>> ages.
>>>
>>> Barry Gills & I have in our contrtibution to our 500 or 5,000
>>> year book been very explicit about  that great difference it does
>>> make. Consider only to begin with the Marx to Wallerstein claim
>>> that  continuoous capital accumulation is the sine qua non
>>> differencia especifica between capitalism and all else. You
>>> cannot have it both ways, that capitalism and hence capital
>>> accumulation is only 200 [Wolf] or 500 [Wallerstein] or 7-800
>>> [Bruadel] years old, AND that accumulation is 5,000 or other
>>> large number of years old. To keep the faith, some have therefore
>>> attributed to us the theis that capitalism is 5,000 years old.
>>> But of course any such claim wold make NONsense of "capitalism",
>>> which would be rendered as NOT differnt from anything else since
>>> the neolithic. Of coure that is NOT our position. On the
>>> contrary, we are forced bby thde evidence and the logic of the
>>> argument to tbe conclusion that ''capitalism'' is an ideological
>>> category wihout any distinguishing historical empiricaal content.
>>> Therefore, best cut the gordina knot and free ouselves from the
>>> shackles that this concept imposes on oour analysis - blinders as
>>> on a jhorse, that prevent us from seeing all reality as it
>>> reallly is, both the reality outside the blinder and alas also
>>> the realith inside the blinders, whch is mistaken for something
>>> special thaat it is not.
>>>
>>> On Sun, 15 Jun 2003 tacer@alumni.bilkent.edu.tr wrote:
>>>
>>>
>>>> Date: Sun, 15 Jun 2003 14:56:49 EEST From:
>>>> tacer@alumni.bilkent.edu.tr To: Luke Rondinaro
>>>> <larondin@yahoo.com>, wsn@csf.colorado.edu Cc: franka@fiu.edu
>>>> Subject: Re: globalization
>>>>
>>>> Even if our globalization is 5000 years old, we must admit that
>>>> she has
>>>
>>> grown up quite fast for last hundred years. From my point of
>>> view, the unchanging parts of the story are brief: First,
>>> core-periphery relationship and dynamics of horizontal
>>> dependency: For several millennia, allocation of resources had
>>> not been evenly distributed among continents and as properly
>>> stated, the Fall of the East preceded the Rise of the West.
>>> Illustrations of this situation are abundant in historical
>>> materials. Secondly, global trade is a meta-chronic reality of
>>> societies; there has always been - there will always be. By means
>>> of trans-continental trade routes, Globalisation always existed.
>>> Nevertheless, those similarities, do the really suffice to draw
>>> the boundaries of the term itself? I am in doubt…
>>>
>>>> Please do not take offence, for I do not refer to forum
>>>> discussions here
>>>
>>> but general discursive climate of World-System theory. There is
>>> an infertile discussion among world-systems scholars on the
>>> beginnings of world-system chronology. In my opinion, it does not
>>> really matter if globalisation has been present for 150 years,
>>> 500 years, 5000 years or Neolithic ages. This issue itself does
>>> not need to be auctioned and if we step backwards any further in
>>> the history, we might find ourselves discussing “the global
>>> challenge of T-rex and Brontosaurus” – for
>>
>> what
>>
>>> reason? Does it help us to understand the essence of capital
>>> accumulation process more fully? Or does it provide a
>>> full-fledged analysis of market formation in early civilisations?
>>> Again, I doubt it does…
>>>
>>>> I suspect serious misconceptions and misnomers on general
>>>> discussion.
>>>
>>> Especially if we go into details of ancient economy, it is
>>> evident that the idea behind economic relationship of modern
>>> times definitely is not same as we suppose for ancient times. I
>>> will not go into detail of this for now, but at first hand we
>>> should differentiate between primitive surplus and accumulated
>>> capital, then distinguish staples from markets.
>>>
>>>> Let me illustrate more precisely: Saving up livelihood to keep
>>>> good conditions for tomorrow, or
>>>
>>> accumulating resources to build up a cistern has nothing to do
>>> with capital accumulation. Those kinds of activities can even be
>>> attributed to animal species; like ants accumulating grains in
>>> their hive to feed next generations. As any other animal species
>>> in the world, human beings were also determined to protect their
>>> communal vitality. I argue that distinctive feature of capitalist
>>> accumulation is a “profit for investment, investment for profit”
>>> loop. This loop requires and involves an appropriate class
>>> casting whose tasks and duties are defined in a capitalist mode
>>> of resource allocation, otherwise we cannot draw a line of
>>> distinction between profit-driven activities and public benefit
>>> expenditures. Using aggregated surplus for militarist superiority
>>> or meeting religious needs appears to me as non-economic
>>> activities. Thus what I believe, saving for future, or
>>> investments that are subjected to re-production of l
>>>
>>>> ife (building aqueducts, cisterns) are pre-capitalist
>>>> activities,
>>>
>>> better should be named as early public expenditures.
>>>
>>>> Another issue is market autonomy that I consider as prerogative
>>>> of
>>>
>>> capitalist world-systems. I believe in the existence of
>>> self-governed markets as I believe its is a product of economic
>>> liberalism. In ancient economies markets were dominated by a
>>> rather complex set of institutional structures, customs, taboos
>>> and religious affiliations. Specific role-definitions were
>>> involved in market participation and even the locations of
>>> staples or marketplaces were determined by a number of
>>> non-economic criteria. In such circumstances, it would not be
>>> appropriate to refer early-market formations in designing the
>>> fundamentals of modern economic system.
>>>
>>>> My arguments are open to discussion. Your comments and
>>>> criticisms are
>>>
>>> welcome, and any reading suggestions are strongly appreciated.
>>>
>>>> Thanks for your interest and best regards
>>>>
>>>> Ozgur Tacer METU Sociology, MA.
>>>>
>>
> ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
>
>
> I would respectfully disagree. Perhaps the "institutional 
structures,customs, taboos,religious affiliations" were/are themselves 
functions of capital accumulation. The history of capital accumulation 
is the history of middlemen whose milieu and raison d'etre were/are 
these cultural differences; partitions which may have been artificially 
and consciously nurtured to preserve the pivotal role of the middlemen. 
It has always been advantageous to keep the markets and sources 
seperate. What better way than by strengthening regional differences of 
language, religion and custom? It is not only the land trade routes that 
were used for transport of goods. It was Buckminster Fuller who spoke of 
the "Great Pirates", a maritime culture that formed the land-locked 
colonies. He details how the brightest youth in the villages were used 
as a natural resource; thus began the Royal school of Economics, and the 
Royal School of Engineering. In other words, the emergence of a 
specialized, compartmentalized way of knowledge that prevented the 'best 
and brightest' from gaining a total systems overview that would 
constitute a threat to the power of the global pirates. The delineation 
he uses to mark the emergence of the industrialized phase of capital 
accumulation is when the pirates extended their rail ship-launching 
capabilities furthur into the lands interiors; thus becoming the 
railroad barons.
As for the statement that it doesn't matter how long this globalization 
existed; I would also disagree. It is also a function of this 
partitioning (so critical to the preservation and furtherance of capital 
accumulation) that in the east we find every emperor becoming the "Huang 
Ti" (First Emperor)or the Yuan Dynasty (Beginning); a tactic that has 
it's analogue in the west as the 'New Deal' or the 'Great Society'. It 
is a tactic that reinforces the illusion of capital accumulation as a 
naturally occurring, progressive evolution.

Duncan Craig
>
>