Protecting Autonomy against Imperialist Coercion
Sanjay Roy
THE imagery of a flat world, embedded in equal partnership and interdependence between countries within the “global village,” based on gains through free trade and market forces while eschewing power from economic relations, ends in a dramatic climax. Those who could not see imperialism in the globalised world, or could only recognise “empire without geography” as capital combined with power in a stateless form, now seem perplexed by the crude justification and assertion of coercion by the US under President Trump. Not only in the corridors of policy making but also within the mainstream academia, free trade and market used to be the mantra, the ideological hallmark of defining progress and development in a globalised world. Most importantly, the assumed objectivity of economic relationships – almost appearing as natural laws independent of power, structural asymmetries and social contestations – now faces serious rethinking.
Trump 2.0 has not only disrupted global trade relations but essentially dismantled all principles of multilateralism by declaring an end to international platforms created to institute norms of global trade. The biggest jolt came to believers and protagonists of free market who could see the neo fascist regime emerging and claiming prominence with the nation-state back to the centre stage in protecting interests of global corporates and military industrial complex, also asserting the existing hierarchies of power in the most explicit manner. It is as if openly saying that whether the market will be free or not whether trade openness is good or bad it is the global elites and their protector US state will decide and the hegemonic narratives will follow accordingly. Suddenly industrial policy, strategic State intervention, dominance of bilateralism gains prominence in policy discourse. The mainstream think tanks seem to be taking little time to gurgle and sing the new anthem of protectionism guided by the powers of global north.
IMPERIALIST COERCION
Trump accuses that the burgeoning trade deficit of the US is because of opening US markets to producers of global south and China took advantage of that. As if US was too generous to producers of the developing world and that’s why they could grow and attain trade surplus in bilateral trade with the US! Although US lost its manufacturing base since the end of the Second World War, they emerged as the financial centre of the world by deliberately transferring production facilities to the south in search of cheap labour and natural resources and accumulate surplus from there. Particularly since dollar emerged as the reserve currency, dollar denominated assets attracted inflow of funds to the US providing resources for US imports. But this place is increasingly becoming vulnerable due to declining relative weight of US economy in the world. The tariff war and weaponisation of tariff is primarily to dismantle the existing norms of global trade and recreate the architecture of dominance through reconfiguring the hierarchies of economies of the world. Whether US accepts it or not, China has emerged as the challenger and economic growth is gravitating towards the global south. BRICS plus countries now account half of world population and 41 per cent of world GDP in PPP terms. The empire is on the decline, and the façade of free market and free trade is increasingly replaced by coercive threat and arm-twisting. Hence trade negotiations and retaliatory tariffs are increasingly becoming instruments to prise open domestic markets for US exports.
US has been subsidising their agricultural products, and their average subsidy turns out to be a significant part of farm incomes. India records a trade surplus with US, and the major agri-exports of India are shrimp and prawns, basmati and non-basmati rice, vegetable extracts, natural honey and processed food products. India imports from US almonds, cotton, crude soybean oil, pistachios and ethyl alcohol. India’s agricultural products are labour intensive while commodities imported from US are capital and resource intensive. India’s tariff on agri-products used to be high compared to the US and the non-tariff barriers such as ban or license requirements are protective measures deployed to protect Indian farmers, fishermen and dairy producers. India also has strict regulations on GM crops and that protects large scale import of genetically manufactured soy and maize from US. It is difficult for any political combination to surrender the interest of sectors that employ roughly 44 per cent of country’s workforce. India is also the largest dairy producer in the world and most of these are produced in small scale enterprises and cooperatives with little dominance of global brands. Hence relaxing tariff and non-tariff barriers would allow global MNCs grab large part of domestic market causing massive unemployment. US aims to dictate our sources and destinations of import and export, impose punitive tariff for importing oil from Russia while maintaining their liberty to import uranium, palladium, fertilizers, chemicals and other commodities from Russia. They also pressurise countries to enhance their defence budget and buy military aircrafts from US.
AUTONOMY AGAINST IMPERIALISM
Imperialist extraction and exploitation of labour and resources of the global south was mediated through international institutions and norms in the garb of free trade. The interest of global capital was protected through the rules of the game, but when the same rules and norms were being used by developing countries to increase their share in the global pie, global capital and their biggest protagonist raises the ugly face, all global institutions fall apart and norms violated, power replaces liberal promises of exchange among equals. Lesser capitals of the developing world and their respective governments who thought that friendship and alliances would provide opportunities for getting a larger share from the big brothers are suddenly taken aback. Nationalism is back with a vengeance! But defending people’s interest requires a different kind of class mobilisation by which the stance of ‘national interest’ needs to be redefined. Rise of India’s nationhood was essentially linked to anti-imperialist struggle against the loot and plunder of foreign rulers. Widespread calls for liberation and acts of patriotic sacrifice enabled class mobilisations and facilitated cross-class alliances in opposition to the British rule.
The people of India came together several times in post-Independence period in episodes of economic and political crisis. And this was possible because our sense of nationhood never allowed division within our citizens. But the real concern in the current regime is the fact that the political combination who are currently at the helm of affairs were never part of the freedom struggle. Their history was to propagate and aspire for a theocratic state, identifying enemies within Indian citizens while undermining the dominance of foreign power. We are perhaps entering into a new phase of world order where globalisation will be explicitly controlled by few imperialist nation-states who are friends and allies of the US. They would try to impose new rules of the game exploiting all sorts of dependence upon US market and the world reserve currency. US and allies will be extracting rents against entry to their markets and would like to puncture our implicit protections that are important to protect livelihoods of majority people. This emerging phase of explicit coercion and arm twisting would be globally executed by neo fascist governments and their allies.
India can’t be an ally of the US and at the same time protect the interests of the people of India. Unfortunately, the ruling party hardly believes in the idea of India that evolved through the freedom struggle. Rather they aspire for Hindu Rashtra and show allegiance to the Zionists and their mission of ethnic cleansing. Their sense of ‘cultural nationalism’ has no conflict with imperialist dominance. But this kind of nationalist ideas would hardly be able to face the current challenge. A political combination that has historical roots in anti-imperialist struggles can only defend the rights of people in an authentic sense by protecting and augmenting the economic and political voice of the majority working people. Such a political combination can truly fight for autonomy from all global powers and can re-define self-reliance and patriotism in the current context.
