Globalist Theory of IR

Marxist PerspectiveImperialist Perspective

Dependency TheoryWorld System Theory

Neo-Gramscian Theory

Focus on the Third World Realists dealt with how can stability be maintained

in an anarchic world?

Pluralists ask how peaceful change can be promoted in an interdependent world.

Globalism tends to focus on why so many third world states in Latin America, Africa, and Asia have been unable to develop.

Emerged as theory to find answers to development problems, but ended up more as an explanation of underdevelopment in the Third World.

What to focus on ? Focus on the structure of the international

capitalist system; division of labour; mode of production, international trade

Capitalist world system is their starting point. They focus on dependency relations within a global political economy.

Globalists focus on the capitalist mode of production, while realists on the distribution of power.

4 Key Assumptions It is necessary to understand the global

context within which states and other entities interact. (particularly the world system theory)

To understand the behavior of individuals, societies or states, one must first understand the global context. Like some realists, the starting point is the international system. The behavior of actors is explained by a system that provides constraints and opportunities.

Second Assumption of Globalism

Importance of historical analysis: only by tracing the historical evolution of the international system it is possible to understand its current structure. The key historical factor and defining characteristic of the international system is capitalism. This particular economic system works to the benefit of some individuals, states but at the expense of others.

Third Assumption of Globalism Globalists assume that particular

mechanisms of domination exist that keep third world countries from developing and that contribute to worldwide uneven development. This requires an examination of dependency relations between northern industrialized countries (Europe and North America) and poorer countries in Africa, Latin America and Asia.

Fourth Assumption of Globalism

It is also assumed that economic factors are absolutely critical in explaining the evolution and functioning of the world capitalist system and putting Third World states to a subordinate position.

Common Points Between Globalists and Pluralists

both focus on political economy. The distinction of high politics and low politics is rejected. For the globalists, politics depend on economics.

realist assumption “state as a unitary and rational actor” is rejected by both perspectives. Both focus on a greater variety of actors, but globalists put more emphasis on the context within which these actors operate than do pluralists.

both globalists and pluralists writing in the transnational tradition emphasize socioeconomic or welfare issues.

Different points between globalists and pluralists

Globalists are not optimistic about peaceful change like pluralists. South subordinated to North and the economic dictates of the world capitalist system make it unlikely that North will make concessions to the South.

Critique to the liberal argument on the benefits of free trade Globalists critize David Ricardo’s Comparative

Advantage theory: ‘each country is endowed with local resources, material, cultural and geographical conditions. Thus, international trade promotes specialization and mutual benefits’.

Globalists argue that British and the later-comers like the US, Russia, Germany and Japan all favored industrialization behind protective tariff barriers. These countries achieved industrialization not under global specialization, but under protection.

Focus on inequality How and why capitalism developed in Western

Europe? How did it expand to other countries, how has capitalism changed over the centuries, what is the relationship between wealthy center and elites of the poor periphery.

The global system is not a uniform marketplace (free market) with actors freely making mutually beneficial contracts, rather, it is divided into powerful central and relatively weak peripheral economies with the former playing an active role and the latter a passive role.

Indicators of World Inequality One-fifth of the world’s population are living in extreme

poverty Average income in the richest 20 countries are 37 times

higher than in the poorest 20 70% of the world’s poor and two-thirds of the world’s

illiterates are women. More than 30.000 children die every day from easily

preventable diseas. In africa only one child in three completes primary

education. One billion people lack acess to clean water African countries pay out $40 million every day on debt

repayment.

Karl Marx (1818-1883): All globalists have been influenced by Marx. Marx

retains his popularity despite the collapse of the Communist Party rule in the former Soviet union. Marx influenced contemporary scholars by his emphasis on exploitation, historical patterns of capitalist development and expansion

Marx’s analysis of international relations aim to reveal the hidden workings of global capitalism. These hidden workings provide the context in which international events occur.

Marx’s perception of international relations is based on the mode of production and classes in a particular country.

Marx’s Materialist Conception of History For Marx, the processes of historical change are

reflection of the economic development of society. For Marx, history was the story of class conflict

generated by economic modernization, not the story of the rise and fall of city states, empires and nation states. Capitalism prospered in the 19th century Europe.

Marx argued that capitalism which involves market exchanges, labor as a commodity, and the factors of production held in private hands produced particular social, political results.

Unit of analysis Unit of analysis: Marxists are interested in

capacity of humanbeings for production. Focus on factors of production and relations of production, thus classes not on states. Conflict between states are replaced with conflicts between classes.

Normative aims of Marxists: create a universal classless society in which humanbeings can realize its potential.

Economic Base

Means of production and relations of production form the economic base of a given society.

Developments in the economic base act as a catalyst for the transformation of the society as a whole.

Superstructure

Political system, legal system and culture form the superstructure.

The legal,political and cultural institutions reflect the pattern of power and control in the economy.

Base-Structure Model The change in the economic base leads

to change in the supertructure: As the means of production develop due to technological progress, previous production relations become outmoded. This in turn leads to a process of social change whereby relations of production are transformed.

Marx’s focus on class analysis Class plays a key role in Marx’s

analysis. In contrast to liberals who beleive that there is essentially a harmony of interest between various social groups, Marxists hold that society is prone to class conflict. The main axis of conflict is between the capitalist class and the working class.

Marx was firstly concerned with the exploitation of the many (working class) by the few (capitalists).

Marx’s focus on class analysis He considered capitalism as an economic

system full of contradictions or internal tensions. These tensions can be resolved only by transformation into a socialist mode of production.

For Marx, capitalism is full of such contradictions that working class will overtake capitalist class. In this way, classless communist society will be created. Thus, capitalism includes a mechanism which will create universal peace and contradictions and tensions at the same time.

Marx’s focus on class analysis

Marx argued that rates of profit would decline because of overproduction and underconsumption. The misery of the working class would increase.

Marx focused on emancipation: The conscious of the proletariat would rise leading ultimately to revolution in all capitalist countries.

Capitalist order would be replaced with a communist society, a society in which wage labor and private property were abolished.

Main characteristics of capitalism For Marx everything involved in production

(raw materials, machines, labor and the commodities themselves) is given an exchange value, and all can be exchanged, one for the other. Under capitalism, everything has its price, including people’ working time.

factors of production is owned by one class: capitalists. As the capitalist class owns the factors of production, they control the profit that results from the labor of the workers.

Karl Marx’s Perception of the State

The state is not viewed in terms of a sovereign entity preoccupied with security concerns.

Rather, state plays role in actively aiding or hindering capitalist accumulation process.

John A. Hobson (1858-1940) and Imperialism Marx’s observations on capitalism in the

19th century have since been modified and generalized to cover the entire globe under various theories of imperialism.

Imperialist theories assume an international, hierarchical division of labor between rich and poor regions of the world, but the relation is not one of mutually beneficial comparative advantage. Rather, it is one of exploitation.

John A. Hobson (1858-1940) and Imperialism Non-Marxist English economist Hobson

was a critic of imperialism. For him, imperialism was the direct result

of the expanding forces of capitalism. He explored the links between

imperialism and international conflict. For him, imperial expansion is driven by a search for new markets and investment opportunities overseas.

John A. Hobson (1858-1940) and Imperialism Hobson noted that capitalist societies

were faced with 3 interrelated problems: overproduction, under consumption by workers and other classes, and oversavings of capitalists.

Capitalists, owners of industries exploited workers, paid lowest possible wages, increased its profits and goods piled up.. who will purchase the excess goods? Given the low wages, working class did not have sufficient purchasing power.

John A. Hobson (1858-1940) and Imperialism How to solve the problem of

underconsumption. Redistribute wealth? Highly unlikely.

Due to overproduction and underconsumption, investment opportunities in the developed world remained limited. The solution was to invest in third world countries. The result was imperialism: channel for the flow of their surplus wealth by seeking foreign markets and foreign investments to take off the goods and capital they cannot sell or use at home.

John A. Hobson (1858-1940) and Imperialism For Hobson, imperialism did not benefit

the home country as a whole. Instead, industrialists and financiers profited.

The drive for capitalist profits by securing overseas territories led to competition and rivalry among European powers. For him, imperialism was a major cause of war.

Vladimir Ilych Lenin (1870-1924) Lenin accepted Marx’s thesis that economic

mode of production determines social and political relations (base-structure model).

Lenin also accepted Marx’s argument that history can only be understood in terms of class conflict.

Lenin was interested in developing a theory that explained the necessity for capitalist exploitation of lesser developed countries and the causes of war among advanced capitalist states.

Vladimir Ilych Lenin (1870-1924) Lenin accepted Hobson’s argument

that underconsumption and overproduction caused capitalists to find foreign markets beyond Europe and engage in imperialism.

Lenin stressed the notion that imperialist policies reflected the existence of monopoly and finance capital or the existence of the highest stage of capitalism.

Highest stage of capitalism

Lenin argued that the character of capitalism defined by Marx had changed.

Capitalism entered into a new stage, which is the highest stage of capitalism.

Capitalism developed such that oligopolies and monopolies controlled the key sectors of the economy, taking over smaller firms, thus need for overseas markets.

As markets expanded they needed more economic inputs such as raw materials, which encouraged the further spread of imperialism to secure such inputs.

Highest stage of capitalism

As a result, a two-tier structure developed within the world economy with a dominant core exploiting the periphery. Thus, there is no harmony of interests between all workers as Marx suggested.

The capitalist class in the core countries could use profits derived from exploiting periphery. Thus, the structural division between core and periphery detemines the relation between capitalist and working classes of each country.

Vladimir Ilych Lenin(1870-1924) For Lenin, imperalism explained why Marx’s

prediction of proletarian revolution in Europe had failed to come about. Economic contradictions inherent in the capitalist mode of production still existed, but imperialism allowed capitalists a breathing space.

Imperialism also benefited working class, buying off the working class in the short term, imperialism delayed the inevitable revolution. But domestic stability was achieved at the cost of wars among capitalist powers that resulted from the continual struggle for overseas markets.

Vladimir Ilych Lenin(1870-1924) For Lenin, imperialism was driven by economic

forces and it was inevitable that such exploitation and eventual conflict would occur.

He disagreed with Hobson who argued that enjoyment of struggle and conquest also played a role in explaining imperialist policies. Lenin also rejected that imperialism was the choice of capitalists.

For him, imperialism was not a matter of choice but inevitable. Imperialism was the direct result of the attainment of monopoly capital.

Vladimir Ilych Lenin(1870-1924) Lenin particularly influenced the

globalist literature with his emphasis on the nature of the global nature of capitalism and its inherent exploitativeness that benefits bourgeoisie in advanced capitalist states at the expense of poorer countries.

For him, all politics, domestic and international take place within the capitalist world economy.

Dependency Theory Lenin’s ideas were developed by the Latin

American Dependency School in the late 1950s under the guidance of the Director of the United Nations Economic Commission for Latin America (ECLA).

It was developed out of the fact that economic growth in the advanced industrialized countries did not lead to growth and development in poorer countries.

A group of Latin American intellectuals (especially economists and sociologists) in the early 1960s, began an overall critique to modernization theory. ECLA's scholars started a set of theoretical approaches that was going to be known generically as Dependency Theory.

Dependency Theory Dependency is a situation in which the

economy of a certain group of countries is conditioned by the development and expansion of another economy.

Dependency is the source of underdevelopment.

Dependency is the result of the imposition of a set of external conditions on Third World development.

Dependency Theory The writers of dependency theory

developed Lenin’s notion of core and periphery in greater depth.

Focus on how elites in industrialized countries (center) interact with their counterparts in the South (periphery). This class analysis emphasizes how transnational ties within the capitalist class work to the disadvantage of workers and peasants in the periphery.

Dependency theory and the role of non-state actors The transnational corporations (TNCs) and

international banks are viewed from a much different perspective than realists or pluralists.

For pluralists, TNCs and international banks appear as beneficial.

For realists, they are of secondary importance. For globalists, they are the agents of

bourgeoisie. By them, third world is maintained and put in their subordinate position within the world capitalist economy.

Basic arguments Historical dimensions of relations of

dependence are rooted in the internationalization of capitalism.

The international system comprises two sets of states metropolitan centre vs. peripheral states.

Underdevelopment are maintained through patterns of interaction or relationships, and inequality and exploitation are intrinsic parts of those interactions.

It is the colonialism and foreign domination that have handicapped the development of the third world.

Basic arguments Poor countries export primary commodities to

the rich countries who then manufacture products out of those commodities and sell them back to the poorer countries (unequal exchange)

The "Value Added" by manufacturing to a usable product is much higher than that to the primary products used to create those products. (raw material vs finished products; agriculture vs industry)

Domestic elite is in an alliance with international capital because they share the same interests.

Domestic factors: Dependency theorists deal not only with

external factors (foreign states, TNCs, international banks, multilateral lending institutions, foreign control of technology, and an international bourgeoisie).

They also deal with internal constraints on development such as class alliances and the role of the state. These internal factors facilitate foreign domination. Some parts of society is favored at the expense of others. Social and economic inequality, ever-widening rural-urban gap.

Underdevelopment formula

The colonial history planted the seed in political, economic, cultural and administrative dependence

Foreign capital and surplus penetrating in the national economy keeping the unequal exchange

Loss of economic control, wealth, distribution to foreign powers

Underdevelopment and economic stagnation

Leading Figures of Dependency Theory Raul Prebisch argued that countries in the

periphery was suffering as a result of the “declining terms of trade”.

He suggested that the price of manufactured goods increased more rapidly than that of raw materials. Thus, it requires more tons of coffee to pay for a refrigerator for instance.

As a result of their reliance on primary goods, each year countries of the periphery are becoming poorer relative to the core.

These arguments were developed further by writers such as Andre Gunder Frank and Henrique Fernando Cardoso.

Samir Amin (1931-) The five monopolies of the Center: 1) Science and Technology (product and

millitary) 2) Financial control (rule-setting) 3) Access to natural resource (extract and

utilizeresources in the periphery) 4) Media and communication (opinion-making

andvalue-sharing) 5) Weapons of mass destruction

Samir Amin’s theses:

Underdevelopment is caused by the trade with the center which destroys local crafts without promoting local industrialization.

Unequal international specialization: Centre producer of finished products while periphery supplies raw material.

Suggestions of solution

Poor countries should embark on programs of import substitution so that they need not purchase the manufactured products from the richer countries.

The poorer countries would still sell their primary products on the world market, but their foreign exchange reserves should not be used to purchase their manufactures from abroad.

The only possibility of avoiding dependency is creating an alternative system of production, a non-capitalist system of production. Here, the majority of dependentist intellectuals were in one way or another proposing "socialism" as alternative.

World System Theory: Differs from dependency theory in two ways:

they are concerned not only with the lack of third world development but also wish to understand the economic, political and social development of regions throughout the entire world. Developed and underdeveloped states, winners and losers are all examined to explain the global existence of uneven development.

aim is to understand the fate of the various parts of the world political economy. Latin America is not unique. Third world underdevelopment and exploitation are central to maintaining the present structure of dominance in the capitalist world system. so, the first priority is to understand this system from a historical perspective.

World System Theory The world systems approach, argues thatthe present inequality and poverty is a directconsequence of the evolution of theinternational political economy into a fairlyrigid division of labor which favored the rich

andpenalized the poor. The modern world-system is a capitalist worldeconomy, which means that it is governed bythe drive for the endless accumulation of

capital

World System Theory This world-system came into existence in

the course of the sixteenth century, and its original division of labor included much of Europe (but not the Russian or Ottoman Empires) and parts of the Americas.

This world-system has been expanding over the centuries, successively incorporating other parts of the world into its division of labor.

Cyclical rhythms of capitalism

The fundamental contradictions of thecapitalist system have been expressedwithin the systemic process by a series

ofcyclical rhythms: capitalist world

economy go through recurrent periods of expansion and subsequent contraction (boom and bust)

Immanuel Wallerstein Immanuel Wallerstein tries to understand the

origins and dynamics of modern world economy and worldwide uneven development. He begins by analyzing the emergence of capitalism in Europe, tracing its development into a capitalist world system that contains a core, periphery and a semi-periphery.

Wallerstein examines the entire global economy from a Marxian perspective. Applying the Marxist approach on the global level. The globe also could be arranged not on the basis of geography but on the Marxian basis of the mode of production and division of labor.

Key Features of Wallerstein’s World System Theory For Wallerstein, the dominant form of social organization has

been world systems. History witnessed two types of world system:world-empires and world-economies.

The main distinction between world-empire and world-economy is about how decisions on ‘who gets what’ are made.

In a world empire, a centralized political system uses its power to redistribute resources from periphery to center.

In a world economy, there is no single centre of political authority, but rather competing centres of power. Resources are nor distributed by a central authority but by the “market“. Nevertheless, the situation is the same: transfer of resources from the periphery to core

Immanuel Wallerstein Contrary to the liberal economic notion of

specialization based on comparative advantage, this division of labour requires and increases inequality between regions.

The basic function of the state is to ensure the continuation of the capitalist mode of production.

Wallerstein and other globalists insist that to understand the development of economic and political processes, we must focus on the development of capitalism. Capitalism is a system wide phenomenon. Wallerstein defines capitalism as “a system of production for sale in a market for profit and appropriation of this profit on the basis of individual or collective ownership”.

Global divisions of world economy Core: countries engaged in banking, manufacturing,

technologically advanced agriculture and shipbuilding. Democratic governments, high wages, import raw materials and export manufactures, high investment, welfare services

Periphery: provided raw materials such as minerals and timber to fuel the core’s economic expansion. Unskilled labor is repressed and the peripheral countries are denied advanced technology that might make them more competitive. Non,democratic governments, export raw materials, import manufactures, very low wages, no welfare services

Semi-periphery: involved in a mix of production activities some associated with core areas and others with peripheral areas. Authoritarian governments, export raw materilas and manufactures, import manufactures and raw materials, low wages and low welfare services

Wallerstein and Anarchy Wallerstein recognizes the importance of

anarchy. For the realist, it enables one to examine international political stability, war, and balance of power politics. For the globalists, anarchy facilitates the development and expansion of world capitalism because no single state can control the entire world economy. The result is an economic division of labor involving a core, periphery and semi-periphery.

Wallerstein and Distribution of Power Like realists, Wallerstein also emphasizes

international distribution of power. The distribution of power cannot be explained without reference to economic order. Key aspect of the system is capitalist, existence of global class relations, and the various functions states and societies perform in the world economy since the 16th century. Under capitalism some states and classes are rewarded, while others are exploited.

Wallerstein is criticized for reducing the system to economics.

Globalist Perspective on the Issue of Change: for globalists, changes within the world

system fall into three categories. - First, there are changes in the actors’

positions within the world capitalist economy. Wallerstein emphasizes constant movement of various actors in the hierarchy of production, profit and consumption. The Dutch empire of 17th century gave way to British domination, and to the US. Despite different core powers, the hierarchical nature of the system remains the same.

Globalist Perspective on the Issue of Change: some scholars indicate phases and cycles of capitalist

development. A period of stability and economic stagnation precedes 20 or 30 years of economic growth. This is then followed by 2 or 3 decades of economic decline, followed again by expansion.

world system is dynamic due to structural transformation of the system: expansion of capitalism to new areas of the globe and nonintegrated sectors of the world economy.

What about the changes of the capitalist system? world system theorists point to one major historical occurrence: transformation of feudalism into capitalism in 16th century Europe.

Beyond capitalism, globalists are ambivalent on the issue of change.

Some of these critics call for revolutions to end capitalist exploitation.

Globalists and Their Critics: the question of causality: Some critics

question whether dependency creates economic and social backwardness as globalists claim or whether it is economic and social backwardness that leads to dependency. No agreement on causality- whether dependency is the cause of backwardness or whether it is the effect of this condition.

Globalists and Their Critics: reliance on economics: critics argued that some

globalists reduced the operation of the international system down to the process of capital accumulation and related dynamics. What about non economic explanations of imperialism.

How to explain 19 the century European powers’ struggle for low economic value places like Chad or the behavior of political units before 16th century.

Thucydides time: validity for anarchy and security dilemma. Competition among sovereign units well before the emergence of the world system. Realists argue that politics-security system largely determine international economic system.

Globalists and Their Critics: system dominance: despite stressing internal

factors, there is excessive reliance on international factors in explaining poverty and dependence in the periphery and domestic variables are downplayed. Lack of economic growth, social unrest and repressive governments are all explained through capitalist system.

globalists are unable to account for anamolies, like third world countries that have been relatively successful economically like Venezuela, Singapore, South Korea, Japan. Critics comment that globalists like Wallerstein and dependency theorists simply group anamolies under the concept of semi-periphery.

Neo-Gramscian perspective Neo-gramscian perspective is based on

the work of the Italian Marxist Antonio Gramsci (1891-1937).

Gramsci was one of the founding members of the Italian Communist Party. He was porisoned in 1926 for his political activities and spent the rest of his time in the prison and wrote “Prison Notebooks (1971)”

Why there was no communist revolution in Western Europe? The key question Gramsci dealt with

was why it was so difficult to promote revolution in Western Europe. Because, Marx had predicted that revolution and transition to socialism would occur first in the advanced capitalist countries. However, it was not Europe but comparatively backward Russia that realized revolution.

What went wrong in Europe? Gramsci’s answer to this question revolves around his use of the concept of hegemony.

Concept of Hegemony

Hegemony is most frequently used to describe the most powerful state in the international system. But, Gramsci’s use of hegemony is related to his understanding of power, which is broader and richer than realists: a mixture of coercion and consent.

Marxist Approach to Hegemony In understanding how the prevailing

order was maintained, Marxists concentrated almost exclusively on the coercive practices and capabilities of the state. State was seen as a means of opressing one class by another. Based on this understanding, it was coercion that prevented the exploited society from rising up and changing the system that makes them suffer.

Gramsci’s Reinterpreting Hegemony Gramsci recognized that while this was true in less

developed countries like Russia, it was not the case in the Western Europe. Here the system was maintained not merely by coercion, but also through consent. Consent is created and recreated by the hegemony of the ruling elite in society.

It is hegemony that makes the political, cultural, and moral values of the dominant group to become widely dispersed throughout society and to be accepted by subordinate groups and classes as their own.

For Gramsci, dominant ideologies are institutionalized in society as they become the “common sense”.

Gramsci’s emphasis on civil society Civil society is the network of

institutions and practices in society that enjoy some autonomy from the state, and through which groups and individuals organize, represent and express themselves to each other and to the state. These include media, education system, churches, voluntary organizations, etc.

Gramsci’s focus on the Superstructure

Superstructure should be emphasized because although the structure of society may be a reflection of social relations of production in the economic base, superstructure (political and cultural practices) determines whether the society is prone to change and transform itself.

Gramsci’s Historic Bloc Historic bloc implies a relation between the

cultural and the political and the economic and also requires an organic link between people and intellectuals, governors and governed, leaders and led.

Historic bloc reflects the way in which leading social forces within a specific national context establish a relationship over contending social forces.

Historical bloc is defined as a situation in which various classes and factions of them are related and implicitly one mode of production is dominant

Counter Hegemonic Struggle If the hegemony of the ruling class is a

key element in the perpetuation of its dominance, then society can only be transformed if that hegemonic position is successfully challenged. This entails a counter-hegemonic struggle in civil society, in which the prevailing hgegemony is undermined , allowing an alternative historic bloc to be constructed.

Robert Cox and the Analysis of World Order Robert Cox introduced Gramsci to the study of world

politics. He criticized prevailing theories of international relations and International Political Economy and tried to develop an alternative framework for the analysis of world politics.

His article “Social Forces, States, and World Orders:Beyond International Relations Theory” (1981): If ideas and values are a reflection of a particular set of social relations, and are transformed as those relations themselves are transformed, then this suggests that all knowledge must reflect a certain context, a certain time and space. In other words, knowledge cannot be objective and timeless as neo-realists argue. For Cox, “theory is always for someone and for some purpose”.

How to transform the world order Realists claim to describe the world as it is, and

as it always will be, but in fact they are reinforcing the ruling hegemony in the current world order.

Cox attempts to develop an emancipatory theoretical understanding of world order that emphasize both the sources of stability in a given system and also the dynamics of processes of transformation.

In this context, Cox benefits from Gramsci’s concept of hegemony and transfers it to the international realm, arguing that hegemony is important for maintaining stability.

How to transform the world order Cox argues that sucessive dominant

powers in the international system have shaped a world order that suits their interests , and have done so not only as a result of their coercive capabilities, but also because they managed to generate broad consent for that order even among the disadvanted groups.

Hegemonic Idea:Free Trade The hegemons like the United Kingdom and the

United States used the hegemonic idea of free trade. Their claim that this system benefits everyone has been so widely accepted that it has attained “common sense” status. However, free trade benefits the hegemonic power as it is the most efficient producer in the global economy, and it can produce goods which are competitive in all markets. The peripheral countries do not benefit from freee trade as much as the hegemon does. As Marxists argue free trade prevents the development of the periphery.

The power of the United States is based on the hegemony of the neo-liberalism.

The hegemony of Neo-liberalism Neo-liberal policies are accepted as the norm

throughout the world. Set of policies most closely associated with the neoliberal project is: privatization, reduction of state spending, liberalization of trade and capital… these policies are also known as “Washington Consensus”

The adoption of neo-liberal policies by Third world countries: spending on health and education decreased, they were forced to rely more on the export of raw materials and import manufactured goods of developed countries.

Moreover, as third world countries devalued their currency as part of neo-liberal policies, the price of their exported raw materials decrease. When third world countries privatize their public enterprises, American or European companies buy them at relatively cheap prices.

Why? If neo-liberal policies have such negative

results, why Third world countries adopted it so widely?

Coercion: debt crisis between the Third World and the West in the 1970s and 1980s. This debt crisis resulted from excessive and unwise lending by Western Banks. Third World countries are unable to pay the interests of these debts and also the debt itself.They applied to IMF for assistance. In order to receive money from the IMF, they had to implement neo-liberal policies.

Key points Gramsci shifted the focus of Marxist analysis

towards superstructural phenomena.Gramsci explored the processes by which consent for a particular social and political system was produced through the operation of hegemony. Hegemony allows the ideas of the ruling elite to become widespread.

Cox attempted to internationalize Gramsci’s thought by transferring his concepts such as hegemony to the global context.