Imperialismo y subdesarrollo

 

"The condition for the massive development of one sector of the imperialist system—the oppressor nation—is the systematic and violent underdevelopment of the other—the colonies and neocolonies of the Third World. The wealth of one is a product of the impoverishment of the other. 

This has involved nothing less than an unparalleled looting of the labor, resources and cultures of the people of Africa, Asia and Latin America by the imperial powers. This begins with the very first expansions of early capitalism. For example, when the British entered India in force, the primitive textile industry of each country was at a similar stage of development. 

The British deliberately wrecked the Indian textile industry to force India to import British textiles. Vast amounts of Indian feudal wealth were stolen in order to provide what Marx called the “primitive accumulation of capital” in England. Indian food agriculture was destroyed to make way for cash crops and raw materials needed for British industry. 

By the late 18th century, the result was the first mass famine in India. In England, the imperialists justified their rule as necessary to care for the “backward and ignorant” Indians. 

Rudyard Kipling and other imperial writers built elaborate justifications for British Empire which rallied generations of English people. In Cuba, when the people lived under US neocolonial control, the entire life of the island was based on the sugar plantation system.

People worked three months and spent nine months unemployed. No other industries were allowed to develop. This gave the sugar companies a ready supply of cheap labor, since the alternative for the Cuban worker was no work at all. 

The most modern form of forced underdevelopment can be seen in the workings of the multinational corporations in the Third World".

"Prairie Fire: The Politics Of Revolutionary Anti-Imperialism". The Weather Underground.