帝国主义

帝国主义是资本主义的最高阶段，垄断与企业操控政府普遍存在于帝国主义的经济体制中。

在弗拉基米尔·列宁对帝国主义的理论中，认为帝国主义由五个基本特征定义： 存在在经济生活中有决定性作用的垄断; 银行资本与工业资本合并为金融寡头控制的金融资本; 资本的输出而不是简单的商品输出; 国际垄断组织形成以及整个世界被强大的资本主义国家瓜分。这种对马克思对资本主义发展的分析的扩展是列宁对政治经济学最重要的理论贡献之一。

帝国主义在全球经济中的发展，也增强了与周边国家之间的联系，主要表现为欠发达国家对帝国主义国家的依附和从属。

理论基础

马克思根据他的运动规律理论得出结论，随着资本主义的发展，它们将不可避免地陷入危机，从而导致内部无产阶级起义，建立无产阶级专政（最终是社会主义）。然而，根据列宁的观察，帝国主义阶段使资本主义能够通过掠夺殖民地来缓解这场危机，殖民地是资本输出的新渠道和新的劳动力来源。

这种资本主义帝国的疯狂扩张迫使各个帝国主义列强开始争夺势力范围、资源和劳动力市场，这导致了破坏性的帝国主义列强内部冲突，如第一次世界大战。因此，帝国主义将资本主义的内在矛盾扩大到了更极端的程度，故此斯大林认为列宁主义是“帝国主义时代的马克思主义”。

帝国主义作为资本主义的一个发展阶段，意味着它将永远以任何足够发达的资本主义生产方式发展。随着市场在一些国家内部饱和，资本必须输出到其他地方，银行的主要功能是帮助实现这一点（参见金融资本主义）。

Countries must eventually turn to imperialism for two main reasons:

1. Capitalism requires constant consumption, which translates into constant growth (and GDP growth). Without GDP growth, capitalism stagnates and a recession occurs. However, since it is impossible to expect infinite growth with finite available resources and as markets become saturated, the bourgeoisie must seek new opportunities.
2. The bourgeoisie is also in constant internal competition, and as such there is a very rational reason for a capitalist to emerge victorious over the competition; accessing untapped markets and cheaper labour will give them an edge over the competition.

However, imperialized countries will not be allowed to develop past the most primitive stage of capitalism, preventing them from developing their own imperialism. In these countries, we may see the emergence of two distinct subsections of the bourgeoisie. Firstly, a "comprador" class, i.e. the section of the national bourgeoisie which is allied with, and dependent upon, foreign imperialist investment; and second the "national" bourgeoisie, whose class interests are, at least temporarily, aligned with the exploited working class-- to achieve national liberation (so that they can become exploiters without being exploited, upon which point their tentative alignment with the national proletariat will end).

Engels

Friedrich Engels alluded to imperialism in The principles of communism:

In this way, all semi-barbarian countries, which had hitherto been more or less strangers to historical development, and whose industry had been based on manufacture, were violently forced out of their isolation. They bought the cheaper commodities of the English and allowed their own manufacturing workers to be ruined. Countries which had known no progress for thousands of years – for example, India – were thoroughly revolutionized, and even China is now on the way to a revolution.

We have come to the point where a new machine invented in England deprives millions of Chinese workers of their livelihood within a year’s time.

In this way, big industry has brought all the people of the Earth into contact with each other, has merged all local markets into one world market, has spread civilization and progress everywhere and has thus ensured that whatever happens in civilized countries will have repercussions in all other countries.

— Engels, Principles of communism

At the time of his writing, imperialism was not yet a word in common use (not until the 1870s) however, policies of imperialism were already happening around the world -- especially at hands of the British Empire in Africa.

Given that imperialism is, (according to Lenin) the highest stage of capitalism, one tendency of imperialism is to export the class conflict of a nation to foreign lands. Thus, the British nation, in order to solve its problem of unemployment and food scarcity along a capitalist basis (without socialism; redistribution of wealth and power to the commoners through social ownership) it had to find new lands to settle the unemployed.

"In order to save the forty million inhabitants of the United Kingdom from a bloody civil war, our colonial statesmen must acquire new lands for settling the surplus population of this country, to provide new markets. ... The Empire, as I have always said, is a bread and butter question."

— Cecil Rhodes, British imperialist, as quoted in Lenin's Imperialism: The Highest Stage of Capitalism

Contemporary times

Imperial core

Today, imperialism is still very much alive as Lenin described. The International Monetary Fund (IMF) and World Bank for example were institutions created for the benefit of the imperial core (the richest and oldest capitalist economies, grossly encompassing North America and Western Europe) so as to perpetually keep former colonised countries in debt that they can not repay. The IMF is known to demand specific free market policies put into place so as to facilitate movement of capital from the imperial core towards these ex-colonies, also known as the Global South. On top of having many strings attached, the IMF is allowed to seize projects when loans cannot be paid back, and they often can't due to very harsh payment plans (usually very high interest rates over a 7-year period).

This "soft" imperialism is not the only form of imperialism happening, and we can look at the US Invasion of Iraq in 2003 for a "harder" form of imperialism. In this case, the entire country of Iraq as well as the surrounding region was destabilized, which allowed U.S. oil companies to eliminate competition and seize these wells for themselves.

Soviet "imperialism"

During the Cold War, a rivalry between the world's two global powers at the time (the USA and the Soviet Union), the CIA's Congress for Cultural Freedom cultivated a milieu of anti-Soviet leftists to advance the geopolitical line of the US. One accusation that was leveled against the Soviet union was that it was yet another imperialist state, based on the conflicts which happened between the Soviet Union and China. USSR did not practice imperialism in the Leninist sense — it did not export capital and was not under control of a financial oligarchy.

Chinese "imperialism"

In modern times, some accuse China of being imperialist, mainly in Africa. These people again use the liberal definition of imperialism and can be ignored in much the same way.

With its Belt and Road Initiative, China does not practice the same harsh policies as the IMF (namely, forcing austerity upon loan recipients) and that is why they are being favored by more and more countries, leading to a disinformation campaign by the imperial core to help drive popular support from the B&R and back towards the IMF. Famously, Chinese loans pay for infrastructure (needed for development), are often forgiven , and there are no policies required to getting such a loan.

Imperialist military

Imperialism is enforced by military power -- especially, since the early 20th century, by U.S. military power. One indication of this is the large number of military bases that the U.S. maintains in foriegn countries and the large number of U.S. troops stationed around the world.

U.S. military personnel in Europe

At the end of 2021, the United States had 74,000 military personnel stationed in Europe in long-term positions (according to the U.S. Congressional Research Service). Not all are combat-ready troops. The numbers of these U.S. personnel in some particular countries is as follows:

• Germany, 36,000
• Italy, 12,000
• Britain, 9,000
• Spain, 3,000
• Turkey, 1,600

Besides these personnel, the U.S. rotates 4,500 troops through Poland.