Social imperialism

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The term social imperialism was coined by the German historian Hans-Ulrich Wehler and describes a theory of imperialism that, along with Mommsen's and Lenin's attempts to explain, is one of the most important theories that are supposed to describe and justify the imperialist aspirations of the great industrial powers in the 19th century .

Definition and background

The social-imperialism theory understands the imperialist endeavors as a foreign policy concept, with which one is to be diverted from the domestic political problems of a state, caused by the rule of a privileged minority over a disadvantaged majority. Accordingly, social imperialism underlines the primacy of foreign policy by letting domestic problem solutions take a back seat to the foreign policy goal of expanding its territory in competition with other expanding nations. One possibility for an effective foreign policy was seen, for example, in the creation of new economic sales markets in colonies and emigration to open an outlet for the population in excess in the mother country - the European population tripled between 1814 and 1914 - so that they could find employment there Find settlement activity. That means that the domestic political grievances were channeled and exported. In 1858 Johann Karl Rodbertus expressed himself critically in that he saw growth policy in world politics: "Every foreign market is therefore like postponing the social question ." Also the prospect of offering the proletariat the chance to differentiate itself from racial " Feeling valued inferior people and thereby moderating the class struggle within is a component of social-imperialism.

For Hannah Arendt , the imperialist “solutions” are attempts to save political conditions that can no longer be justified. For the real solution to the social and political structures, which were already clearly outdated at the end of the 19th century, would then have required two world wars.

Social imperialism in Bolshevik and Maoist ideology

In the ideological concepts of the Bolsheviks in Russia and the Maoists in China, the theory of social imperialism played an important role in propaganda: imperialism was viewed as the highest form of capitalism, according to which “the replacement of competition by monopoly” was the “basic economic feature” (WI Lenin , Imperialism and the split in socialism) . According to the further definition, this also includes the expression of social-imperialism, since this is a characteristic of “dying capitalism” (ibid.).

The bad relations between the People's Republic of China and the USSR later led the Maoists from China to apply the term “social-imperialism” to the socialist USSR, as the expansionist efforts of the Soviet Union had the character of social-imperialist plans.

Theory of social imperialism according to Wehler

Hans-Ulrich Wehler developed the theory of social imperialism from the late 1960s . This is a " strategy of the ruling elites [...] to guide the dynamics of the economy and the forces of social and political emancipation into external expansion, to divert attention from the internal shortcomings of the socio-economic and political system and through real successes of its expansion [... ] to compensate. "

According to Wehler, the social-imperialist strategy of the Reich government was based on the assumption that an expansive foreign policy would lead to economic prosperity. Domestically, this factor should have contributed to preventing changes in the traditional social structure (conservative utopia). Wehler initially assumed the policy of the German Chancellor Bismarck between 1870/71 and 1890. Later he extended his theory to the phase of German "world politics" from 1897 to 1914/18, in which the diversion from internal tensions was more likely to result from an increase in national prestige than from economic success.

Wehler nevertheless admitted that the strategy of social-imperialism had ultimately failed: Germany's expansive foreign policy was neither economically nor politically successful and was therefore unable to create a permanent diversion from domestic political problems.

In the scientific discussion today, the theory of social-imperialism is regarded as a barely sustainable overall interpretation of the imperialist policy pursued by Germany. It is criticized, for example, that the constraints to which the German government was subject to domestic and foreign policy are not adequately taken into account. The influence of the imperialist-oriented agitation associations (e.g. Pan-German Association and German Fleet Association ), which exerted strong public pressure on the government, remains secondary. In addition, the negligible economic importance of colonial policy is pointed out. A “coherent and widely accepted 'imperial culture'” has not developed in Germany.

Critics also complain that Wehler's theory ignores the various ideologies that co-founded and fueled imperialism.

United States social-imperialism

In other writings, Hans-Ulrich Wehler mentions the USA as a social-imperialist country and refers to the period of the “first Cuban Missile Crisis ” from 1895 to 1898.
At that time, Cuba was still under the rule of the Spanish Crown - a constitutional monarchy - and was the largest supplier of sugar of the USA. At the time of the Cuban Revolution in 1895, the island was repeatedly rioted by rebels ( guerrillas ). America initially watched the events in its immediate vicinity calmly. As long as the sugar imports could still be maintained, the American government did not consider standing between the fronts of Spain and the insurgents. But then foreign policy developed along the lines of social imperialism. Because when the insurgents began to destroy sugar cane plantations and sugar mills, which brought the export of sugar to a standstill, America thought of interference.
This example could therefore be seen as social-imperialist action, because at the same time all the newspapers of the “ Yellow Press ” in the USA were celebrating all the successes of the rebellious Cubans and thus also praising the reluctance of the government. That only changed when the company's own advantage in the form of steady sugar imports was no longer there and the United States appeared to need to intervene to calmly restore the previous situation.

Situation in Great Britain

Hannah Arendt sees an alliance between capital and mob coming, especially in Great Britain, in the second half of the 19th century , which has been realized overseas. To explain it, she follows Rosa Luxemburg's analysis when she states that “from the beginning, capitalist production in its forms and laws of movement was calculated for the entire earth as the treasury of the forces of production”. The capital resulting from the expanding production, which found no more investment opportunities domestically, thus became “superfluous” because it no longer had a meaningful social function, was exported and thus saved the bourgeoisie from becoming parasitic. At the same time, population growth and capitalist development have pushed people into permanent unemployment and produced human waste.

Australia: Life-size bronze sculptures in memory of convicts as road builders from 1815 through the Blue Mountains: two convicts, engl. Soldier, two Aborigines (one undercover). Location: Katoomba , not far from Echo-Point

In this context, Cecil Rhodes said that the only way to avoid civil war was to become an imperialist. According to H. Arendt, individual emigration solutions were initially available for the superfluous: "Neither Canada , Australia nor the United States could have been populated without them."

South Africa has become , in a different sense, the first “greenhouse of imperialism”: “Side by side with capital, the gold diggers, the adventurers, the mob of the big cities moved to the dark continent from industrially developed countries. And from now on the mob, generated by the enormous accumulation of capital in the 19th century, accompanied its creator on all of its adventurous voyages of discovery, during which there was nothing to discover but profitable investment opportunities. ”Such is the age of imperialism, that of one Abundance of money and human power was born, with the production of goods that were least needed in the production process, namely gold and diamonds . The alliance of capital and mob would be "at the beginning of all consistently imperialist politics". The mob was made up of the rubbish of all classes and strata and stood outside the class-divided nation and was characterized by “inherent irresponsibility”. Only England had the great luck "to limit this alliance to its overseas possessions" and thus to be able to save its own nation from destruction.

“The salvation and future of the fatherland”: social-imperialism in France

Prison building on the Îles du Salut ("Islands of Salvation")

Olivier Le Cour Grandmaison wrote in his book “ La République impériale. Politique et racisme d'État ”(2009) analyzes forms of the French variant of social-imperialism. Although demographics in France have not followed European growth, France has been plagued by the obsession of suffocation from too many people and has sought remedy. In the concept of living space , social imperialism sought ways out for all social problems of the mother country, the metropolis , and developed ideas of social hygiene . One of the leading colonial theorists - Joseph Chailley-Bert (1854-1928) - developed it in his book " Le rôle social de la colonization " (1897). In connection with the colonial development, social hygiene and criminal law policy have become the subject of scientific research, for which institutions specially dedicated to the colonies have been created. Africa was seen as a favored area because it was seen as a historyless and therefore innocent continent from which an “economic and political laboratory, a real experimental basis” for new opportunities for “salvation” could be made. Following the example of England , so-called dépotoirs - French for "garbage dumps", a term common at the time - were to be found for the "unsuitable", the "undisciplined", those who had recidivists, for the human "waste" and "left behind" . Emigration was seen as having a twofold purification option: for France it had a social effect, and for those affected individually, because what had been harmful to the metropolis up to then would become enterprising colonizers in French Guiana , Africa, Indochina or New Caledonia Would build worlds. (See for Australia : First Fleet .)

Moralism and socially hygienic thoughts have merged and contributed to a work of common health care. It was about the realization of the idea of ​​“la 'Plus Grande France”, the “greater France”. Jurists such as Arthur Girault (1865–1931), who worked at the Academy of Colonial Sciences, also exerted lasting influence. For Girault (1895) the colonies offered a “precious drain”: “If the art of governing consists in putting everyone in their designated place, then probably the most delicate government task is to find one for the adventurous, discontented and undisciplined minds To find employment. "

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ See on this Michael Zürn, Neorealistische und Realistische Schule , p. 311, in: Dieter Nohlen (ed.) Lexikon der Politik , Vol. 6: International Relations , ed. by Andreas Boeckh, Gutenberg Book Guild, Frankfurt a. M. Vienna 1994; ISBN 3-7632-4936-2 ; Pp. 309-322.
  2. ↑ Dirk van Laak , About everything in the world. German Imperialism in the 19th and 20th Centuries , Munich 2005, p. 36.
  3. ↑ See the Rodbertus quote and the proletariat Dirk van Laak, Über alles in der Welt. German Imperialism in the 19th and 20th Centuries , Munich 2005, p. 34.
  4. ↑ Hannah Arendt, Elements and Origins of Total Dominion . Antisemitism, imperialism, total rule , Munich 1956, 8th edition 2001, p. 332.
  5. ↑ Online version: Lenin, The Imperialism and the Split of Socialism
  6. ↑ Hans-Ulrich Wehler, Sozialimperialismus , p. 86, in: Imperialismus , Ed. H.-U.Wehler, Cologne 1970; 4th ed., Königstein 1979, pp. 83-96.
  7. ↑ Dirk van Laak, About everything in the world. German Imperialism in the 19th and 20th Centuries , Munich 2005, p. 121.
  8. ↑ In the introduction to his book Das Deutsche Kaiserreich 1871-1918 , Kleine Vandenhoeck-Reihe, Volume 1380, Deutsche Geschichte, Volume 9, 7., bibl. supplementary edition, Vandenhoeck Ruprecht, Göttingen 1994; ISBN 978-3-525-33542-0 , Wehler expressly addresses the criticism.
  9. ↑ See H.-U. Wehler, The Rise of American Imperialism. Studies on the development of the Imperium Americanum 1865-1900 , Göttingen 1974, ²1987.
  10. ↑ In “Elements and Origins” (EuU), p. 334.
  11. ↑ See Olivier Le Cour Grandmaison, La République impériale. Politique et racisme d'État , Fayard: Paris 2009, p. 287.
  12. ↑ EuU, p. 338 f.
  13. ↑ EuU, p. 340.
  14. ↑ EuU, p. 347 f.
  15. ↑ Olivier Le Cour Grandmaison (2009), pp. 282-329; on Chailley-Bert p. 285.
  16. ↑ Olivier Le Cour Grandmaison (2009), p. 290.
  17. ↑ Olivier Le Cour Grandmaison (2009), pp. 299-303.
  18. ^ Charles Dilkes wrote his book " Greater Britain " in England in 1869 (cf. H. Arendt, EuU, p. 397); Paul Rohrbach published his work “The Greater Germany” in August 1915 (cf. Tomáš Garrigue Masaryk , Das neue Europa , p. 181). There is an analogous reflection in the demand for “Greater Israel” or Greater Israel .
  19. ↑ Olivier Le Cour Grandmaison (2009), p. 300 f.