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> Why is this not feeding developing countries? Because that is not the problem, the problem is neocolonialism/imperialism the highest stage of capitalism[1].

> Why is this not feeding developing countries? Because that is not the problem, the problem is neocolonialism/imperialism the highest stage of capitalism[1]. 1. https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Imperialism,_the_Highest_Stage_of_Capitalism https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Imperialism,_the_Highest_Sta...

TheUndead96 7y ago
I can see how this is true of fast food, motor vehicles and electronics, not necessarily fresh produce. A South African winefarm can only make South African wine in South Africa. Coca-cola and Heineken can (and do) make their product the world over, wherever it is consumed. If anything, vertical farming should be able to produce the consistent "big mac" equivalent of the tomato/lettuce/potato? Am I incorrect in the sentiment of the capitalist argument here?
- Arn_Thor 7y ago
  If wealth overall is being drained from the country that depletes the stock of resources that would otherwise have been reinvested locally in industry and agriculture. A simplification, of course, but the principle applies.
  - TheUndead96 7y ago
    Yes, I can definitely agree with this.
- pjc50 7y ago
  Amartya Sen's Nobel-prize-winning work on famine is probably the best read here. He points out that the problem is rarely lack of food, but lack of claim on food. People end up unable to afford it, no matter how cheap it might be. "Solutions" which involve heavy capital investment and depend on imported items aren't going to make it cheaper. It's even possible to end up with situations where food is destroyed because it cannot economically be sold, while people are also starving. This is not about food but about power.
  - TheUndead96 7y ago
    Started reading their essay. This is incredibly interesting, I was not aware of this.
    - pjc50 7y ago
      Glad to be of service! If you want another possibly transformational read, Hernando De Soto's The Other Path has a lot of interesting things to say about rule of law and property rights.
scandox 7y ago
Well that posits the certain existence of an alternative global economic system that would ensure everyone got fed. So while it might be accurate to say that "neocolonialism/imperialism at the highest stage of capitalism" is a system under which people's basic needs are not met, it can't be accurate to say it is "the problem".
- esailija 7y ago
  > Well that posits the certain existence of an alternative global economic system that would ensure everyone got fed The problem isn't that there isn't such a system the problem is how to implement the system without people who benefit from current system trying to destroy it. But we can extrapolate from the fact that even in the most ridiculously unfair conditions such systems have managed to feed people far better than any capitalist country in same or even comparable conditions.
PaulAJ 7y ago
Except he turned out to be wrong.
- esailija 7y ago
  I don't see a single prediction in the summary that isn't spot on about current affairs.
  - benj111 7y ago
    It misses out the service economy. Yes you can point to cobalt being extracted in Africa or wherever. But that misses out the money being made in finance. It misses the Googles making billions from advertising. Look at the richest GDP per capita countries [1] Luxembourgs wealth isnt based on digging rocks out the ground. [1] https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_countries_by_GDP_(nominal)_per_capita https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_countries_by_GDP_(no...
    - esailija 7y ago
      > It misses out the service economy. No it doesn't, labor aristocracy is literally one of the predictions on the summary. > But that misses out the money being made in finance. It misses the Googles making billions from advertising. None of those produce anything, they are entirely dependent on actual production. > Look at the richest GDP per capita countries [1] GDP per capita is just the GDP divided by population, and GDP itself is not necessarily about production at all.
      - benj111 7y ago
        We still have farms, most economies aren't regarded as agrarian as most of the money is made elsewhere. "None of those produce anything, they are entirely dependent on actual production" They might not produce something physical, but then neither does a musician, or a writer. They're a part of the economy though, my entire point is that your link ignores non physical bits of the economy, but that is now the dominant part of the economy, so the theory is at least outdated. "GDP per capita is just the GDP divided by population, and GDP itself is not necessarily about production at all" How would you like to measure production then? Cars per person? Per nation? Is a Tata equivalent to Ferrari? I know what GDP per capita is, that's why I used it, have you got any particular reason why I should be using absolute GDP figures?
gridlockd 7y ago
Pretty ironic, given that Soviet Russia ended up far more imperialistic than any so-called capitalist nation.
- esailija 7y ago
  I don't know what that has to do with anything. But it's interesting that you think Soviet Union had megacorporations exploiting other countries for superprofits and did it even better than current megacorporations.
  - gridlockd 7y ago
    You may then be surprised to hear that the word "imperialism" has a meaning that does not imply capitalism or corporations of any form: https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Imperialism https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Imperialism
    - esailija 7y ago
      I searched the article and the word capitalism appears 13 times on it so it's hard to see how it doesn't refute your own claim. Also capitalism implies imperialism, not the other way around.
      - gridlockd 7y ago
        Maybe you should have read the article instead, or at least the introductory paragraph, which states: "Imperialism was both normal and common worldwide throughout recorded history, the earliest examples dating from the mid-third millennium BC, diminishing only in the late 20th century." I am not aware of any capitalists or corporations predating the Iron Age, but perhaps you can enlighten me there. > Also capitalism implies imperialism, not the other way around. I would disagree that capitalism implies imperialism, but let's put that aside. My claim was exactly that imperialism doesn't imply capitalism, so I guess we agree on that? Non-implication is not exclusion, mind you. The Soviet Union was imperialist, but not capitalist. Having said, that, I'm sure there is a fruitless debate to be had with those Trotzkists that would claim that the Soviet Union was imperialist, capitalist and fascist[1]. [1] https://www.marxists.org/history/erol/ncm-3/iwk-ussr.htm https://www.marxists.org/history/erol/ncm-3/iwk-ussr.htm

TheUndead96 7y ago

I can see how this is true of fast food, motor vehicles and electronics, not necessarily fresh produce. A South African winefarm can only make South African wine in South Africa. Coca-cola and Heineken can (and do) make their product the world over, wherever it is consumed. If anything, vertical farming should be able to produce the consistent "big mac" equivalent of the tomato/lettuce/potato? Am I incorrect in the sentiment of the capitalist argument here?

Arn_Thor 7y ago
If wealth overall is being drained from the country that depletes the stock of resources that would otherwise have been reinvested locally in industry and agriculture. A simplification, of course, but the principle applies.
- TheUndead96 7y ago
  Yes, I can definitely agree with this.
pjc50 7y ago
Amartya Sen's Nobel-prize-winning work on famine is probably the best read here. He points out that the problem is rarely lack of food, but lack of claim on food. People end up unable to afford it, no matter how cheap it might be. "Solutions" which involve heavy capital investment and depend on imported items aren't going to make it cheaper. It's even possible to end up with situations where food is destroyed because it cannot economically be sold, while people are also starving. This is not about food but about power.
- TheUndead96 7y ago
  Started reading their essay. This is incredibly interesting, I was not aware of this.
  - pjc50 7y ago
    Glad to be of service! If you want another possibly transformational read, Hernando De Soto's The Other Path has a lot of interesting things to say about rule of law and property rights.

scandox 7y ago

Well that posits the certain existence of an alternative global economic system that would ensure everyone got fed. So while it might be accurate to say that "neocolonialism/imperialism at the highest stage of capitalism" is a system under which people's basic needs are not met, it can't be accurate to say it is "the problem".

esailija 7y ago
> Well that posits the certain existence of an alternative global economic system that would ensure everyone got fed The problem isn't that there isn't such a system the problem is how to implement the system without people who benefit from current system trying to destroy it. But we can extrapolate from the fact that even in the most ridiculously unfair conditions such systems have managed to feed people far better than any capitalist country in same or even comparable conditions.

PaulAJ 7y ago

Except he turned out to be wrong.

esailija 7y ago
I don't see a single prediction in the summary that isn't spot on about current affairs.
- benj111 7y ago
  It misses out the service economy. Yes you can point to cobalt being extracted in Africa or wherever. But that misses out the money being made in finance. It misses the Googles making billions from advertising. Look at the richest GDP per capita countries [1] Luxembourgs wealth isnt based on digging rocks out the ground. [1] https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_countries_by_GDP_(nominal)_per_capita https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_countries_by_GDP_(no...
  - esailija 7y ago
    > It misses out the service economy. No it doesn't, labor aristocracy is literally one of the predictions on the summary. > But that misses out the money being made in finance. It misses the Googles making billions from advertising. None of those produce anything, they are entirely dependent on actual production. > Look at the richest GDP per capita countries [1] GDP per capita is just the GDP divided by population, and GDP itself is not necessarily about production at all.
    - benj111 7y ago
      We still have farms, most economies aren't regarded as agrarian as most of the money is made elsewhere. "None of those produce anything, they are entirely dependent on actual production" They might not produce something physical, but then neither does a musician, or a writer. They're a part of the economy though, my entire point is that your link ignores non physical bits of the economy, but that is now the dominant part of the economy, so the theory is at least outdated. "GDP per capita is just the GDP divided by population, and GDP itself is not necessarily about production at all" How would you like to measure production then? Cars per person? Per nation? Is a Tata equivalent to Ferrari? I know what GDP per capita is, that's why I used it, have you got any particular reason why I should be using absolute GDP figures?

gridlockd 7y ago

Pretty ironic, given that Soviet Russia ended up far more imperialistic than any so-called capitalist nation.

esailija 7y ago
I don't know what that has to do with anything. But it's interesting that you think Soviet Union had megacorporations exploiting other countries for superprofits and did it even better than current megacorporations.
- gridlockd 7y ago
  You may then be surprised to hear that the word "imperialism" has a meaning that does not imply capitalism or corporations of any form: https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Imperialism https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Imperialism
  - esailija 7y ago
    I searched the article and the word capitalism appears 13 times on it so it's hard to see how it doesn't refute your own claim. Also capitalism implies imperialism, not the other way around.
    - gridlockd 7y ago
      Maybe you should have read the article instead, or at least the introductory paragraph, which states: "Imperialism was both normal and common worldwide throughout recorded history, the earliest examples dating from the mid-third millennium BC, diminishing only in the late 20th century." I am not aware of any capitalists or corporations predating the Iron Age, but perhaps you can enlighten me there. > Also capitalism implies imperialism, not the other way around. I would disagree that capitalism implies imperialism, but let's put that aside. My claim was exactly that imperialism doesn't imply capitalism, so I guess we agree on that? Non-implication is not exclusion, mind you. The Soviet Union was imperialist, but not capitalist. Having said, that, I'm sure there is a fruitless debate to be had with those Trotzkists that would claim that the Soviet Union was imperialist, capitalist and fascist[1]. [1] https://www.marxists.org/history/erol/ncm-3/iwk-ussr.htm https://www.marxists.org/history/erol/ncm-3/iwk-ussr.htm