This is a weekly thread in which we read through books on and related to imperialism and geopolitics. Last week’s thread is here.
Welcome to the fifth week of Michael Hudson’s Super Imperialism: The Origin and Fundamentals of US World Dominance! I’m reading the Third Edition.
We are reading one chapter per week, meaning we will finish in June. Obviously, you are totally free to read faster than this pace and look at my/our commentary once we’ve caught up to you.
Every week, I will write a summary of the chapter(s) read, for those who have already read the book and don’t wish to reread, can’t follow along for various reasons, or for those joining later who want to dive right in to the next book without needing to pick this one up too. I will post all my chapter summaries in this final thread, for access in one convenient location. Please comment or message me directly if you wish to be pinged for this group.
This week, we will be reading Chapter 4: America’s New Deal Puts Its Own Economy First, 1933-1940, which is approximately 22 pages.
Finally caught up! As other comrades have noted, I am unconvinced by Hudson’s claims of financial relations being the primary cause of World War II. I certainly believe it played a role, but not nearly as important a role as Hudson claims it to have played.
That being said, the sheer depth of understanding of this lever of Imperialism makes this book incredibly valuable for my understanding of US foreign policy, and how the Empire functions today. It’s great that we read/reread Lenin first though, as this is a very critical read that can be easy to overblow without firm grounding in Marxist theory, in my opinion.