Western Imperialism Against Primitive Communism. A New Reading of Rosa Luxemburg’s Economic Writings

Abstract

The discussion on Rosa Luxemburg’s theories of imperialism has
mainly focused on the economic argument - the schemes of reproduction, the
process of circulation, the need for “external” markets, etc. There is however
another dimension, at least as important : the struggle of imperialism against
pre-capitalist economies, the ruthless destruction of “natural” and peasant economies,
many of them being forms of primitive communism. Luxemburg’s
interest for primitive communist societies is documented by her Introduction
to Political Economy and the imperialist war against them is discussed both in
this work and in the last chapters of The Accumulation of Capital. A wholly
original approach to the evolution of social formations, running counter to
linear “progressive” views of bourgeois ideology, is outlined in these reflections. Present indigenous struggles e.g. in Latin America, against multinational oil or mining companies, illustrate the topicality of Rosa Luxemburg’s argument in the 21th century.