Structuralism
and Global Capitalist System: Interconnected
By:
Diani Lestari
In
this opportunity, I would like to explain a bit about structuralism. What is
structuralism? Basicly structuralism is a theory that sees the world from the
view of the oppressed classes, poor and developing countries so according to them,
this present world economy system is unfair, unbalance, and need some changes. Moreover,
structure in structuralism refers to global capitalist system and global
capitalist system is what also shapes society’s economic, political, and social
institutions. That is why structuralists always criticize current global
capitalist system.
The
basic idea of structuralism is rooted from the ideas of Karl Marx, but the rest
is different from socialism or communism. And there are four Marxist ideas that
crucial for structuralists analyses of international political economy. That
four Marxist ideas are no longer genuine Marxist ideas but already improved and
modified to fit to these present world situation by neo-Marxists, and
structuralists. The following four Marxist ideas are: the definition of class,
class conflict and the exploitation of workers, capitalist control over the
states, and ideological manipulation.
The definiton of class;
Class is determined from the lot or at least the ownership of capital. And, of
course, only a few people who have the capital and they are commonly referred
to as the bourgeois. Here, capital means privately owned assets used to produce
the commodities or goods in an economy (pp. 112). So the majority of people called the working
class or those who do not have a capital. Therefore this situation is often
criticized for inflicting injustice. Class
conflict and the exploitation of workers; due to these class, of course the
working class should work to capital owner to fullfil the needs of their life.
Capital owner would have the power to be working class. Positive or negative
power depends on the capital owner. It will result in the exploitation of the
working class when the capital owner use their power in negative way. In the
end, working class have no other choice: do it or you starve to death. Capitalist control over the states;
this idea also associated with the idea before. Power of capital owner tends to
have an impact on the political system. In addition, states also require
capital owner in terms of income for state because the capital owner produces
income from production itself. Structuralists believe that the superior
financial resources of capitalists and the difficulties inherent in forming
large worker or social movements give capitalists the advantage in most
countries today (pp. 115). The last
idea is Ideological manipulation;
here an idea is a belief and an ideology is simply a set of beliefs (pp. 116). Capitalist have their own
goal which is to make capitalist system looked like the only good system to
rule the world. Once again, Marxists see this situation as the unfair situation
because the capital owner have many resources to promote their ideology while
the working class that only have fewer resources to promote their own belief.
The results is workers are often fooled into believing that this system will
give them benefit and unconsiously they make themselves exploitated.
Moreover,
there are some recent structuralist theories of dependency, the modern world
system, and modern imperialism or neo-imperialism. Dependency theory; according to dependency theorists, in this
world, nations divided into two parts: core and peripheral countries. Global
political economy this day only put through peripheral countries (less
developed countries in South) dependent to core countries (capitalist countries
in North). There are several strategies for developing countries to cope with
this, but the most extreme strategy is
reforming the international economy or known as the "new
international economic order (NIEO). Modern
world system theory; pursuant to MWS theorists, in this world, nations
divided into three parts: capitalist core states, agricultural periphery
states, and labor-intensive industries semiperipheral states. For Immanuel
Wallerstein, the core states dominated peripheral states in the way the using
them for extracting raw materials rather than using them as a market that
favorable for both. The core interacts with semiperpheral and peripheral
through the global capitalist system, exploiting these regions, and also
transforming them (pp.122). Neo-imperialism theory; neo-imperialism
means that the states no longer need to occupy other countries either to
exploit or control them. Here, nations only divided into two parts: core and
peripheral countries. Because no longer occupy other countries, imperialism
done by core countries with come through peripheral via trade, investment, and
other policies that created them dependent to the core countries.
Subsequent
to all these explanation about structuralism, we just cannot close our eyes and
deny it anymore that core-peripheral countries and capital owner-working class
really happened in our world, today. Because these day of global economy system
is full of flaws in many ways with the real examples such as financial
economics and international conflicts. And we may conclude that, from
structuralist perspective our world is need some changes or slightly
improvements in the fundamental system.
Source:
“ Chapter 6. Economic Determinism and Exploitation: The Structuralist
Perspective” in Balaam, David N and Bradford Dillman. Introduction to International Political Economy (Fifth Edition),
pp.107-132. Pearson Longman, 2011.
2 comments:
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