Geography 352

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• Geography 352
• Urbanization in the Global South
• Jim Glassman
• Lecture 7, January 27

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Basic Principles of Marxist Political Economy

• Politics and economics (and culture)
  interpenetrate
• Class struggle is underlying force in historical
  transformation
• Capitalism is historically progressive process,
  preceding socialism
• Capitalism always develops unevenly (at all
  scales)

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Marxism on Uneven Development

• Imperialism
• Division between city and countryside (Marx on
  rural idiocy)
• Uneven development within the city (working class
  poverty)

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Fundamentalist Marxism on Urbanization

• Rapid urbanization not bad in itself
• Uneven development within city is a class
  phenomenon, not a spatial phenomenon
• Imbalances in urbanization process demand
  socialist strategy
• Global South problems cannot be solved by
  nationalist agenda

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Fundamentalist Marxist critique of dependency
theory

• Criticism of Global South underdevelopment and
  stagnation thesis
• Criticism of dependency theorys lack of class
  fundamentalism

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Harveys analysis of urbanization under capitalism

• Uneven development
• Issue of the three circuits and capital switching
• Primary circuit basic productive circuit
• Secondary circuit fixed asset and consumption
  fund formation
• Tertiary circuit investment in science,
  technology, and reproduction of labor power

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Switching and switching crises

• Importance of the states role
• Switching as a way of alleviating immediate
  crises (a spatial fix)
• Switching as an aid to future growth
• Switching as basis for future crises (the
  impossibility of a permanent fix)
• Switching, crises, war, and imperialism

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The state in Marxist theory

• The state as a tool of capitalist management
• The state as structured by capitalist interests
• The state as a site of class struggle
• Implications for policy no plan rational state

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Does switching work the same way in the Global
South?

• Problems of infrastructure (secondary circuit)
  development
• Problems of human capital (tertiary circuit)
  development
• Are these quantitative problems (e.g., countries
  in the South are just lagging behind) or
  qualitative problems (e.g., countries in the
  South are in a structurally different position)?

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Do states in the Global South resemble those in
the North?

• Democratic versus authoritarian governance
• State autonomy versus subordination in the global
  system
• Transnational capital and states in the Global
  South the erosion of state power and capacity?

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Twentieth century developments in Marxism and
leftist struggle

• Lenin, the Russian revolution, and the rise of
  Marxism outside the Global North
• Leninism versus social democratic reformism
• European workers movements and social democratic
  reformism
• Fordism and social democratic reformism
• Leninism and critique of imperialism

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Maoism and the rise of neo-Marxism in the Global
South

• The Chinese revolution
• Maos transformation of Marxist theory
• Maoism and revolutionary struggle in the Global
  South
• Peasants and workers as revolutionary agents
• National-popular struggles versus workers
  struggles
• Maoism and dependency theory

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Fundamentalist Marxism (FM) vs. Maoism on
urbanization

• Rapid urbanization
• FM Not in itself a bad thing
• Maoism Reflective of neo-colonial domination
• Uneven development
• FM strong emphasis on inequalities in the city
• Maoism strong emphasis on urban/rural and global
  inequalities

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FM vs. Maoism (cont.)

• Socialist strategy
• FM centered around urban working class of
  advanced industrial capitalist countries
• Maoism centered around popular-nationalist
  coalitions
• Approach to problems in the Global South
• FM Not soluble through nationalist agenda
  emphasis on internationalism
• Maoism nationalist agenda in Global South is
  starting point for global socialist movement

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FM vs. Maoism (cont.)

• Primacy, parasitism, overurbanization
• FM do not need to be directly attacked since
  they are predictable expressions of capitalist
  development and will generate an urban working
  class
• Maoism are predictable expressions of capitalist
  development, but in peripheral contexts hinder
  prospects for progressive change and need to be
  attacked through strategies that decentralize
  political and economic power, allowing for more
  broad-based, even development

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The theory and record of Maoist revolutionary
change

• China (the model of rural revolution)
• Southeast Asia (similar to China?)
• Vietnam (revolutionary support everywhere)
• Cambodia (rural base of revolution)
• Latin America (urban base for rural actions?)
• Cuba
• Nicaragua