Riccardo Parboni: The Dollar and its Rivals, New Left Books, 1981, £3.95.
The Dollar and its Rivals is the most important book on inter-imperialist competition to appear since Ernest Mandel's Europe Versus America? was published in 1970. This is not to say that the book is without serious flaws: indeed Parboni falls into a classic error of bourgeois economics in his suggestion that the economic crisis and decline in the rate of profit have been caused by increased competition rather than constituting its basis.
This is not an academic point; it is essential for the understanding of the post-war world. As Parboni correctly points out, American imperialism sacrificed certain short term advantages in relation to its rivals immediately after the war by taking steps to rebuild West European and Japanese capitalism. This was, above all, forced on it by the fear of revolution and of the Soviet workers' state. But it was made possible by the absolute gains to be made from the enormous economic boom which the massive destruction of capital and weakening or smashing of the working class in many countries by fascism and war had put on the agenda.
Today such sacrifices relative to competing capitalisms can no longer be compensated for by an expansion of the world economy as a whole. It is necessary for each capitalist power to seek to expand its position at the expense of its rivals. Just as the long boom lessened inter-imperialist rivalries, so the onset of crisis and stagnation has heightened them. As Parboni himself explains, in the present period the United States is using its absolute superiority as the most powerful capitalist state to reinforce its relative advantage over its competitors. Because he does not understand that it is a consequence of the decline in the rate of profit, Parboni cannot explain why the increase in competition and this turnabout in the global role of the USA should have occurred when it did.
A second criticism is that Parboni puts too much emphasis on a particular aspect of the monetary policy of US imperialism. Dollar devaluations were a key element of American policy during the 1970s but they are not the only tactic for exploiting its domination of the international monetary system. Reagan has used increases in the exchange rate of the dollar to boost the value of American exports and to put up the cost to America's competitors of oil, whose price is fixed in dollars, without paying more itself.
Despite these criticisms, an overall assessment of the book must be overwhelmingly positive. It makes excellent use of well-chosen [illegible] books that scatter numbers around to look impressive. Each point is precisely illustrated with the crucial qualitative facts. An excellent example comes on the very first page: 'Through 1966, the total value of North American manufacturing production was higher than that of Western Europe and Japan combined. Since 1975, however, it has been lower than that of Western Europe alone.' This one simple fact, more than any complicated series of tables, shows the dramatic shift in the economic relation of forces which has taken place in the post-war period.
Secondly, it provides an impressive overall view of the world economy. Naturally, Parboni concentrates on developments within the major imperialist countries. But his analysis of the neo-colonial economies and their integration into the world economy is exemplary. He traces the economic roots of 'non-alignment' in the 1950s and early 1960s in attempts at independent national capital accumulation by the indigenous ruling classes. Nasserism, Peronism, Sukharnism, etc were dictatorial regimes which improved the economic and social conditions of the working class with the objective of creating an internal market.
From the mid-1960s onwards, a quite different 'model' became dominant. The Brazilian, South Korean, Phillipine, and similar regimes, are based precisely on abandoning any attempt at independent accumulation and on total integration into the imperialist division of labour and markets. The result is not merely a new and unprecedently brutal form of dictatorship but the systematic driving down of the conditions of the masses. The political expression of the new model is the end of 'non-alignment' and the substitution of total subordination to the imperialist powers.
This whole section of Parboni's book, though brief, is the best rejoinder I have seen to the currently-fashionable apologias for imperialism developed by Warren and others. Parboni shows imperialism in its true light; unable to develop the majority of states of the world, it enforces new savage attacks on the working class and suppression of democratic rights in those where some development does take place.
Finally, what about Parboni's key theme of inter-imperialist rivalry? To assess its significance one need only regard world events since the Polish coup; Reagan announces economic sanctions 'against the USSR' which would in reality hit just as severely the members of the EEC, West Germany rejects sanctions and France signs a 25 year gas contract with the Soviet Union, France agrees to sell arms to Nicaragua in the middle of a massive campaign against that country by the US government. The EEC takes initiatives towards the Arab states which at least in key tactical respects break with the framework laid down by the USA and Israel. All this amounts to a major new development in international politics compared to the period of inter-imperialist calm which has prevailed since 1945.
It is this, rather than mythical contradictions between 'west coast cowboys' and 'east coast yankees' which explains the politics of Reaganism. The US ruling class is in reality one of the most centralised in the world and far from running down traditional 'east coast' industries (steel, auto, etc) the Reagan administration is preserving and protecting them. In reality, Reaganism represents a massive assertion of specifically American imperialist interests. Certainly this is directed against the working class, against the USSR and against the colonial revolution, but it is also directed against the United States' imperialist rivals.
Parboni provides a clear description of the emerging inter-imperialist competition but he also indicates its limits. The US holds two decisive cards: total military superiority, which Parboni does not discuss in detail, and control of the international monetary system, which is one of the major themes of the book. In the final analysis, the United States will always be able to out-trump its rivals: there will be no third world war between the imperialist states; it would mean the end of the capitalist system as a whole and they are well aware of this. However, between the 'here and now' and the 'final analysis' lie many important political developments to whose unfolding, despite its theoretical flaws, Parboni's book [illegible].