Imperialism, the system of states in the world economy is exactly the same, as these relations and competition between capitals. As Trotsky put it, in 1916, describing the competition between capitals.
“Capitalism has transferred into the field of international relations the same methods applied by it in “regulating” the internal economic life of the nations. The path of competition is the path of systematically annihilating the small and medium-sized enterprises and of achieving the supremacy of big capital. World competition of the capitalist forces means the systematic subjection of the small, medium-sized and backward nations by the great and greatest capitalist powers. The more developed the technique of capitalism, the greater the role played by finance capital, and the higher the demands of militarism, all the more grows the dependency of the small states on the great powers. This process, forming as it does an integral element of imperialist mechanics, flourishes undisturbed also in times of peace by means of state loans, railway and other concessions, military-diplomatic agreements, etc. The war uncovered and accelerated this process by introducing the factor of open violence. The war destroys the last shreds of the “independence” of small states, quite apart from the military outcome of the conflict between the two basic enemy camps.”
This illustrates the idealist, utopian nature of the demands for “self-determination” of small nations and states, raised by liberals, including those that call themselves socialists and even “Marxists”, in the age of imperialism. What is more the demand for self-determination for these small nations, in the age of imperialism, is itself reactionary, in the same way that the demands for protecting the interests of small producers, the break-up of monopolies and so on is reactionary. The nation state, just like small private capital, became a fetter on the further rational development of capital more than a century ago, and only reactionaries seek to defend it, or move back towards it, where it has already been superseded.
In other words, just as, every so often, the mechanics of the capitalist economy results in a rearrangement of relations between capitals, with some of the smaller capitals again being subsumed within the bigger capitals, whilst occasionally some of the smaller capitals, to compete, merge to form larger capitals (as with the EU, Mercosur, ACFTU, and so on), and even very occasionally, a tiny number of small capitals, particularly in new spheres of production, become big capitals themselves (China, India, Brazil), so too, in terms of the global capitalist economy, but now it is not companies being considered, but states. And, just as the shifting fortunes of different large companies brings about changes in the laws, regulations and so on, designed to defend and advance their collective interests, so too with the changing relations between states, as some, now, have a bigger economic-military weight, have a bigger say at the table of global decision making, and sharing out of the spoils, and others, therefore, less (as with Britain after Brexit).
A large part of the intensity of the current disturbances is the fact that, after 75 years, the hegemony of the US has collapsed. It is challenged by the EU as the world's largest single economy, and by China, as the fastest growing economy, not to mention these other new big economies like India, Brazil and so on, and, in contrast to the last 30 years, during which time the US did not have to consider the military response of Russia, now it does. The US bully, and its NATO gang, is finding that some of the small kids it used to push around, have grown up, and learned to fight back, as well as finding others to bully themselves. The US/NATO bully simply wants us to believe it is now not the bully we should be concerned with, but its former victims, and that NATO is now the protector of the victims of its own former targets, (this is a bit like the way Marx described the feudal landlords presenting themselves as defenders of workers against the industrial bourgeoisie that had supplanted it) just as with one gang of organised criminals, offering protection to the victims of its new rivals. There is nothing new in the world; old imperialist powers always presented themselves in that manner as defenders of the weak against other and new imperialist rivals, expecting that their own past and current deeds would not be considered.
And social-democracy, rather than pointing out this reality, has, instead, just as it did prior to WWI and II, simply made itself a tool of NATO imperialism in its family feud with its uppity ruling class cousins in Russia and China. Its just like some socialists tied themselves to the ranks of "feudal socialism", as described by Marx in The Communist Manifesto. But, its not just that the actions of western social-democracy – which is the political representation of the interests of imperialist capital – by its actions, is fostering the support for nationalism, and Bonapartism in Russia and China, its actions are doing the same in the West too, and the consequences of the economic warfare it has now embarked on, may well exacerbate that much further. As Trotsky put it,
"Fascism is a form of despair in the petit-bourgeois masses, who carry away with them over the precipice a part of the proletariat as well. Despair as is known, takes hold when all roads of salvation are cut off. The triple bankruptcy of democracy, Social Democracy and the Comintern was the prerequisite for fascism. All three have tied their fate to the fate of imperialism. All three bring nothing to the masses but despair and by this assure the triumph of fascism."
(Phrases and Reality, p 19)
As set out above, the actions of western countries, and particularly the support given to them by the social-democratic parties in those countries, inevitably is seen by the workers in Russia and China, as an attack on them, and not just on the leaders of those countries. But, it is also seen as useless in the western democracies too, and with good reason. Conservative social-democracy has dealt with the crisis faced by the ruling class of falling asset prices, caused by rising interest rates, in turn caused by the underlying tendency of the economy to expand, by printing huge amounts of money tokens, so as to buy up the increasingly worthless paper assets, and by attempting to hold back the tendency for the economy to expand, and so lead to rising interest rates. The former simply inflates even larger asset price bubbles whilst the latter, restrains the growth of profits which is the only sustainable basis of asset prices, but, in any case, has repeatedly failed, despite the use of fiscal austerity, trade wars, and even the physical lockdown of social activity for two years!
The other consequence is that a huge disparity of social wealth is created. Its basis is not that of capitalism in its earlier phases, whereby the wealth of the ruling class resides in its ownership of real industrial capital, but where it now resides in its ownership of fictitious-capital, worthless scraps of paper, such as shares or bonds, or their derivatives, or in the ownership of land and property, not for its use value in production, but simply as a source of paper capital gains.
Not only do those excluded from this paper chase lose out in terms of their paper wealth, and ability to draw revenues by liquidating paper capital gains, but by deliberately holding back economic activity, in the service of these higher asset prices, large sections of society are condemned to precarious employment, or unemployment, part-employment, and so on, reflected in the long-term stagnation of urban areas, with many confined and consigned to the ranks of the petty-bourgeoisie, as unable to obtain secure permanent employment, they have to turn to self-employment, the employment of family labour, and so on. Its most extreme manifestation is the growth of those who become self-employed on the fringe of society, at best engaged in activity that is only marginally legal, and at worst is simply criminal, drug dealing, petty theft and so on. It creates the class of petty-bourgeois and lumpen elements that have always been the cannon fodder of Bonapartism and fascism.
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